Secondary bond market

FOMC members backed maintaining asset purchases, although “a couple” were “open” to “weighting purchases of Treasury securities toward longer maturities,” according to minutes released Wednesday.

Without the benefit of a larger new-issue calendar, secondary trading is likely to continue the theme of the final two months of 2020: more bidders than bonds.

From the Centennials to the COVID generation, the municipal market's demographics will change dramatically in the next decade as will the way investors view investing in munis.

Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago President Charles Evans says monetary policy will need to remain “accommodative for quite a while,” since inflation won’t hit a 2% average for “a long time.”

The new-issue calendar builds from almost nothing to $2.4 billion in the first week of the New Year, with deals ranging from education to taxables to social bonds on tap for investors.

Dominick D'Eramo, head of fixed income at Wilmington Trust Investment Advisors, talks with Chip Barnett about how the municipal bond market did in 2020 and what may be on tap for munis in the new year. (12 minutes)

Municipal bond funds saw $2.086 billion of inflows in the week ended Dec. 22, the Investment Company Institute reported Wednesday after a $2.517 billion inflow the week prior.

While there are no major sales on the calendar for this week, some larger deals from and Texas, California, New Jersey and Colorado issuers are on tap for the first few weeks of 2021.

Refinitiv Lipper reported tax-exempt mutual funds saw $1.288 billion of inflows in the week ended Dec. 23, the seventh week in a row investors put cash into the funds.

IHS Ipreo estimates the week's bond volume at $7.3 million in a calendar composed only of small negotiated deals.