Florida’s ports will be getting $250 million in state and federal funds to help speed their economic recovery from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, Gov. Ron DeSantis said Thursday. The money is coming in through the federal American Rescue Plan President Biden signed in March and its Coronavirus State Fiscal Recovery Fund. It is
Bonds
A Michigan Supreme Court order paves the way for Detroit voters to decide the fate of charter revisions opposed by Mayor Mike Duggan, who warns they threaten the city’s fiscal independence. The state’s high court, in a split decision published Thursday, reversed Wayne County Circuit Court and Court of Appeals decisions removing Proposal P from
Puerto Rico net General Fund revenues came in 3.1% ahead of projections in May. The Puerto Rico Department of the Treasury said through the first 11 months of fiscal 2020-2021, net revenues were ahead by 1.14%, at $10.2 billion. The Treasury Department’s actual figures are compared to the Puerto Rico Oversight Board’s projections. In May
Triple-A benchmarks were little changed on Friday while U.S. Treasuries ended the week stronger amid mixed economic data. Muni participants await a new month with growing issuance, but perhaps not quite enough as issuers are hesitant to add more debt before final word from Washington on infrastructure. The net negative supply likely will keep interest
Issuance in July fell more than 30% short of 2020 figures but is roughly 13% above the month’s 10-year average, while total issuance for the year-to-date is ahead of last year’s record-breaking pace by a small margin. At $31.9 billion, municipal bond volume was 33.1% lower this month than July 2020 when it totaled a
As climate change accelerates, electric grids are expected to experience severe weather events that are well beyond the historical conditions for which they were built. In this session, moderator Donald J. Gonzales, senior managing director of the San Antonio office of Estrada Hinojosa & Co., Inc. is joined by panelists Chris Jumper, director of Assured;
The Chicago Board of Education approved a federal aid-infused budget amid warnings of a financial cliff that could knock it off the track needed to win back investment-grade ratings. The board unanimously approved the $9.3 billion spending package for the fiscal year that began July 1. It directs $707 million toward capital and spends down
The Federal Reserve has toyed for years with opening something called a standing repo facility to prevent short-term rates markets from blowing up. Following a 2019 disruption and another early in the pandemic, the central bank finally took that step. The permanent repurchase-agreement facility, one for domestic firms and another for foreign ones, will backstop
A U.S. Virgin Islands senator has introduced a bill to appoint a “special investigator” to look into malfeasance and corruption at the islands’ financially struggling Water and Power Authority. The bill would require a thorough examination of the authority’s contracts, leases, billing practices, professionals’ credit card use, and its loss of $2 million to an
Municipals were slightly firmer in secondary trading while new-issues were repriced to lower yields from initial pricing wires. U.S. Treasuries were stronger and equities sold off ahead of the FOMC meeting Wednesday. The current market technicals combined with a slowdown in issuance is creating a general malaise in the municipal market, according to a New
“Have you seen the price of taco seasoning lately?” Thus began my most recent conversation with Kelly Brown, CEO of The American Deposit Management Co. (ADM). Kelly admitted she rarely looks at prices in the supermarket, but when she saw a package of taco seasoning priced at $1.79, she was taken aback. Kelly and I
Municipals were stronger on the short end, hitting record low levels for the second time this year, in quiet trading while U.S. Treasuries were treading water and equities did much the same as all markets await Wednesday’s Federal Open Market Committee meeting announcement. Triple-A benchmarks moved one to two basis points lower inside of five
MarketAxess is growing a pilot program that helps buy-side institutions and minority, women- and veteran-owned broker dealers more easily trade with one another in the secondary on the firm’s platform. The Diversity Dealer Initiative leverages MarketAxess’ anonymous all-to-all Open Trading marketplace and provides enhanced trading connections by allowing investor clients to select a diversity dealer
The Puerto Rico Oversight Board cast doubt Friday on a temporary deal between the truckers and the interim governor which is pausing the truckers’ strike. Around 9:30 p.m. Thursday Gov. Pedro Pierluisi announced the temporary deal in two tweets. The deal was with the striking truckers’ union, Frente Amplio de Camioneros. Pierluisi was off the
Akron, Ohio-based FirstEnergy Corp. agreed to pay $230 million to resolve federal charges in connection with an alleged bribery scheme involving a $1 billion public bailout for two nuclear power plants owned by a bankrupt subsidiary with municipal debt. Federal authorities charged the public utility holding company with conspiring to commit honest services wire fraud.
What bond-market guru Mohammed El-Erian said Friday was enough to make bond investors listen like they’re in an old E.F. Hutton commercial. “Inflation is not going to be transitory,” the chief economic adviser at Allianz SE said in an interview on Bloomberg TV. El-Erian likened it to his belief in 1999 that Argentina would default,
Municipals were steady in typical summer Friday style ahead of a less-than-robust new-issue calendar to end July. The U.S. Treasury 10-year ends 10 basis points higher than it started the week, but back to levels of a week ago, while the stock market rallied and earnings pushed them to all-time record highs Friday. Triple-A benchmarks
The Puerto Rico Aqueduct and Sewer Authority plans to refund $1.8 billion of outstanding 2012 debt in an August deal, coming into a market that is starved for high-yield paper. For several months the authority and the Puerto Rico Oversight Board has mentioned the possibility of refunding the authority’s Series 2012A bonds. On Friday it
A busy Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board quarterly board meeting saw Patrick Brett selected as fiscal year 2022 chair, the adoption of a multi-year strategic plan, decisions on several regulatory initiatives and the adoption of a $43 million operating budget. Those and other developments emerged at the MSRB’s in-person meeting held July 21-22 in Washington. Brett,
Analysts say a strike of Puerto Rico truckers is a threat to the island’s economy and a challenge for the Oversight Board. The board spent a page in the most recent fiscal plan talking about the need to not extend the minimum rates to privately negotiated trucking contracts. The truckers are striking for this as