Investments

The 10 largest underwriters of education issuance in the first half of 2024 accounted for $48.172 billion.

The 10 largest bond counsels of education issuance in the first half of 2024 accounted for $28.829 billion.

While the asset class is still in the red for October, it has pared back earlier losses. The Bloomberg Municipal Index is at negative 1.42% in October and positive 0.84% year to date.

The Michigan Finance Authority closed on $79.5 million of distributable state aid fifth lien and LTGO financial recovery refunding bonds issued for Detroit.

The infrastructure grants are bolstered by bond financing.

The Metropolitan College of New York wants to sell real estate in lower Manhattan as part of a deal with bondholders allowing the school to skip a debt payment

The 10 largest issuers of education issuance in the first half of 2024 accounted for $15.219 billion.

The deal was the latest billion-dollar-plus transaction for one of the P3 airport terminal projects at John F. Kennedy International Airport.

Education issuance in the first half of 2024 rose 27% year-over-year, increasing to $64.516 billion across 1,646 issues from $50.796 billion in 1,559 transactions from 1H 2023.

The correction to the municipal market has improved muni to UST ratios while uncertainty hangs over ahead of the election. J.P. Morgan's Peter DeGroot said the firm expects the end of next week "will mark the end of the difficult technical period in 2024 and believe that net supply in November will lead to better valuations broadly in the municipal market."

"We have made good progress, but inflation is still running above the FOMC's 2% objective," said Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland President Beth Hammack.

Several macro trends have converged to drive growth in municipal bond issuance, said participants at The Bond Buyer's California Public Finance conference.

Vales is currently a director for fixed-income focused broker-dealer InspereX and an independent trustee for the Axonic Funds, having previously served as the CEO of electronic trading platform TMC Bonds, which ICE acquired in 2019.

The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board held its first board meeting over Oct. 23-24, where it approved a number of rule proposals and requests.

Build America Mutual insured the majority of the maturities in the West Contra Costa Unified School District GO deal.

The downgrade affects $2.1 billion in bond debt and extends to its utility debt.

While fundamentals remain strong — with credit upgrades outpacing downgrades by 3.5 times so far in 2024 — technical factors have been "less supportive," Principal Asset Management strategists said in a report.

Geography is playing a role in financial health as debt issuance rises.

San Francisco's slow recovery from the pandemic and continued financial pressures drove the downgrade, Moody's analysts said.