Refunding bonds

S&P Global Ratings upgraded Chicago Public Schools to BB-minus from B-plus, and Fitch Ratings upgraded it to BB from BB-minus, ahead of a $369 million deal.

The Illinois Sports Facilities Authority received a two-notch S&P Global Ratings upgrade to BBB.

Houston expects strong demand for the refunding bonds pricing on two days this week.

The fixed-rate bonds refund more than 50% of the Indianapolis Airport Authority’s floating rate bonds and terminate associated interest rate swaps.

The deal through the Indianapolis Local Public Improvement Bond Bank will refund floating-rate debt issued in 2010 to a fixed rate.

The committee also unanimously voted Tuesday to reverse a planned $7.6 billion cut in highway spending that’s scheduled to take effect in a year.

The refunding would be completed “for traditional savings” and not for restructuring purposes, the school district says.

Texas A&M University System will price $430 million of taxable bonds, including $230 million to advance refund tax-exempt debt.

CommonSpirit Health will sell $2.7 billion of taxable bonds and $3.1 billion of tax-exempt debt, with BBB-plus ratings, into a supply-starved market.

The authority reports $193 million of present value savings on a $651 million refunding.

The role of SLGS has been significantly diminished by the termination of advance refundings on Jan. 1, 2018, under the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, with the amount of SLGS outstanding declining more than 49%.

The positive side is the bipartisan legislation for reinstatement introduced by 10 House lawmakers last week has a high possibility of being included in any infrastructure legislation that passes that chamber.

The orchestra received a first-time A rating from S&P Global Ratings ahead of its bond sale next week.

Municipal bond industry groups have been clamoring for advance refundings to be reintroduced as well as an expansion of PABs and direct-pay bonds.

The University of Texas System will bring $386.8 million of refunding bonds to market this week.

Fiona Ma has been pushing the state's bond team to explore refundings and to sell new money bonds while rates remain low.

Gary Community School Corp. in Indiana wants to test its access to the bond market with a $5 million bond refunding.

The audit concluded a year and one day after the sports authority received a letter dated April 4, 2018, informing it that the tax-exempt status of the bonds was being examined.

Midwest Fertilizer Co. announced Monday it has settled with the IRS Office of Appeals an audit that originally disqualified the tax-exempt status of $1.259 billion of refunding bonds that will be used to help finance a fertilizer plant in Posey County, Indiana.

Reps. Steve Stivers, R-Ohio and Dutch Ruppersberger, D-Md., are also drumming up support for the muni market's role in infrastructure finance.