Investments

CHICAGO - Southern Illinois University will enter the market as soon as next Thursday with $54 million of tax-exempt and taxable Build America Bonds in a deal led by BMO Capital Markets, which the school picked due to its work on a handful of similarly structured BAB transactions over the last two weeks.

ARKANSASMarion School District No. 3 of Crittenden CountyApr 28, 2009 . . . . . . $4,600,000

ALABAMABaptist Health Health Care Authority, An Affiliate of UAB Health SystemApr 16, 2009 . . . . . . $111,195,000

By the end of 2007, investors recognized the relationship between municipal bond yields and Treasury yields did not mean what it used to.Click to see larger version of chart.Now, some investors have taken it a step further. Some ignore the relationship altogether.

IOWAGMG Community School DistrictApr 27, 2009 . . . . . . $1,700,000

ALABAMAJackson (City)Apr 28, 2009 . . . . . . $3,000,000

Standard & Poor’s has affirmed its AAA rating on the Dallas County Community College District’s outstanding debt and its upcoming $110 million general obligation bond sale.

GEORGIAAlpharetta (City)Apr 24, 2009 . . . . . . $8,415,000

ARIZONAArizona Transportation BoardApr 23, 2009 . . . . . . $55,420,000

Investors poured the most money into municipal bond mutual funds in years last week amid a powerful rally in the tax-exempt market.

The National Academy of Sciences on Thursday aims to sell $57.5 million of variable-rate revenue debt to refund 1999 bonds. The deal is rated triple-A by Moody’s Investors Service and Standard & Poor’s based on a letter of credit from Bank of America.

With underwriters and investors still buzzing about last week's historic Build America Bond blitz in California, the municipal market is gearing up for the arrival of another significant slate - highlighted by $2 billion of Florida bonds - that will bring an estimated $6.28 billion in total issuance to the market in the last week of April, according to Ipreo and The Bond Buyer.

President Obama on Friday ratcheted up his push to eliminate the Federal Family Education Loan program, saying he's prepared to fight "wasteful subsidies" to student lenders..

Tender-option bond programs last year lost a lot of money on a controversial premise: that long-term municipal bond yields are fundamentally and inefficiently too high.

CALIFORNIAOrange County Sanitation DistrictApr 23, 2009 . . . . . . $200,000,000

ARIZONAArizona State University Nanotechnology LLCApr 22, 2009 . . . . . . $35,040,000

Tax-exempt money market funds fell by $6.96 billion to end the week of April 20 with $474.51 billion in total assets, according to the Money Fund Report, a service of iMoneyNet.com.

The Bond Buyer’s weekly yield indexes declined this week on the back of a surge of Build America Bonds in the primary market, including more than $5 billion of the new securities from California.

FLORIDAJEAApr 21, 2009 . . . . . . $64,305,000

ARKANSASHermitage School District No. 12 of Bradley CountyApr 22, 2009 . . . . . . $3,800,000