Primary bond market

The state of Illinois is preparing to issue $600 million in new Build Illinois junior sales tax revenue bonds next week.

After this week's sale, the state intends to issue another series of refunding bonds in February in connection with a potential tender offer for taxable GOs and a current refunding of some tax-exempt GOs.

Despite the outperformance this week, and while the asset class had "a stellar December, which rounded out a very solid year," Barclays PLC strategists said the high-grade muni market has become "quite rich."

The muni market enters this year from a relative position of strength, said Jeff Lipton, managing director and head of municipal research and strategy at Oppenheimer.

This year has favorable potential for 1Q activity, noting an unusually large scheduled reinvestment potential in January and February, including $19 billion of maturities plus calls in January and $24.9 billion in February, noted MMA's Matt Fabian.

"Buyers went all in on revenue-sector names, with that category earning 6.8% and beating out GOs by 127 basis points," said FHN Financial's Kim Olsan. "Sub-sectors within the revenue category pointed to a risk-on theme into year-end." 

This performance is a dramatic rebound from 2022's losses.

The muni market saw $379.992 billion of debt issued in 2023, only $11.076 billion less than the lackluster $391.068 billion seen in 2022.

LSEG Lipper reported Thursday that investors pulled $463.7 million from muni mutual funds for the week ending Wednesday after inflows of $147 million the week prior.

Participants are mixed on whether there will be continued growth in 2024, but some still see a universe of taxable bonds that still can be tendered.

Late-month volumes are "waning as it appears the year's tax-loss harvesting was accomplished leading up to the holiday period," said Kim Olsan, senior vice president of municipal bond trading at FHN Financial.

Munis' strong performance from November continued into December, said Miguel Laranjeiro, a portfolio manager at abrdn.

The year is ending on a strong note, said Joshua Perry, a partner, portfolio manager and municipal credit analyst at Brown Advisory.

LSEG Lipper reported Thursday that investors added $147 million to muni mutual funds for the week ending Wednesday after outflows of $514.5 million the week prior. High-yield saw some outflows, though.

The issuer is set to come to market with general revenue bonds the week of Jan. 21, according to its investor website.

The Investment Company Institute reported more outflows from municipal bond mutual funds for the week ending Dec. 13, with investors pulling $588 million from the funds.

The county plans to sell $2.5 billion of tax-exempt sewer revenue warrants to refund the debt issued to finance its 2013 exit from Chapter 9 bankruptcy.

The Bloomberg Municipal Index has returned 1.90% so far in December and 5.96% year-to-date, while the High-Yield Index is up 2.75% this month and 8.94% in 2023. Taxable munis are returning 3.98% in December bringing year-to-date returns to 7.83%.

The Philadelphia-based financial advisory firm has used BVAL for several years, but once the full interpolated curve and the intraday hourly changes were released on the EMMA, PFM decided to use BVAL as its primary pricing curve.

With fears of further Fed hikes subsided, Birch Creek strategists said with "loads of cash still sitting on the sidelines, and expectations that cash will no longer earn 5%+, we believe the muni market will benefit in 2024 from a return of investors looking to allocate to the asset class."