It's all relative: CLO spreads explore record tights as credit indices hit impasse
CLO spreads are grinding to ever tighter levels, despite a flattish week for credit in which corporate credit indices have ended up more or less unchanged

Global CLO league tables - January 2021
Global CLO league tables - January 2021 YTD

It's all relative: CLOs are lagging no more, as Carlyle deal drags market tighter
“CLOs are lagging” has been a much repeated refrain over the last nine months. But Carlyle Group has this week produced a US CLO that has dragged spreads to their tightest point in three years so that, rather than comparing CLOs to pre-covid levels, they should be assessed against early 2018

At least 2020 wasn’t dreadful for CLOs
Last year’s downturn was another in which CLOs survived and in many cases thrived as active management and Libor floors helped managers deliver 13%-plus returns to equity

CLO pipeline: OFS to make comeback as 2020 absentees eye new issues
As liability spreads tighten day by day, the CLO pipeline is filling fast. 2020 absentees are joining the parade as four US managers and three European managers aim to return to the new issue market after taking a break of 12 months or longer

OC health check: CLOs end 2020 with fragile recovery
Only 109 CLOs breached an overcollateralisation test in December, falling from 121 in November. This in turn was down from the 147 CLOs that breached an OC test in October, but 33 cured their breaches in November and a further 11 cured all OC test failures in December

Beneath the triple C: 13 CLO loans take a dive but defaults subside to a ripple
22 corporate debt issuers were downgraded to triple C or below in November and December by Moody’s or S&P, out of which 13 can be found in CLO portfolios  – hurting $4.55 billion of US CLO loans, €1.87 billion of European CLO portfolios and almost $80 million of middle market CLOs loans, according to CLO-i

Global 2020 CLO league tables
Global 2020 CLO league tables 

Vaccine boosts credit as PE firms open up to bridge loans
The leveraged loan and CLO markets ended 2020 on a long-awaited high after multiple vaccines for covid-19 were rubber-stamped by regulators

It's all relative: Euro CLO mezz rallies to follow month-long IG/HY compression
European credit suffered this week with Brexit talks between the UK and the EU dragging on and both sides conceding that a trade deal is unlikely to be reached by Sunday’s deadline. But European CLO tranches have held up reasonably well with mezzanine spreads tightening by almost 13% in December

Global CLO league tables - November 2020 YTD
Global CLO league tables - November 2020 YTD

LP round up: Arcmont, Ares and Sixth Street win European direct lending mandates
Investors have allocated around $2 billion to credit funds in recent weeks, according to board documentation seen by Creditflux. Among those to recieve allocations include ADM, Arcmont, Ares, Audax, Bain, Centerbridge, Clearlake, Goldman Sachs merchant banking,  Invesco, Monarch, Oaktree, Raven, Sixth Street and Sound Mark

Europe leads corporate credit rally, but US outperforms in CLOs
iTraxx Crossover has been the CDS market's outperformer this week, tightening over 30 basis points, or 11.4%, to trade at 235bp today. But in the CLO market, US deals have come out on top thanks to a BlackRock CLO that priced its double Bs at some of the tightest levels this year

Compression plays out as HY and European CLO double Bs outperform
Investment grade and high yield credit spreads have tightened in sync with each other this week, but CDS and CLOs alike underline that the big theme over the past month has been compression between investment grade and high yield

CLO pipeline: LCM switches arranger to complete deal and join issuance surge
Over $3.5 billion of global CLO issuance priced last week and managers in all three CLO markets are taking advantage of tightening spreads across the capital structure after three major covid-19 vaccine breakthroughs and increased confidence since the US presidential election

Beneath the triple C: cinemas get clipped but default picture improves
14 corporate debt issuers were downgraded to triple C or below in October by Moody’s or Standard & Poor’s – hurting $3.15 billion of US CLO loans, €761.73 million of European CLO portfolios and $37.95 million of middle market CLOs loans, according to CLO-i. Cinema chains were among those to suffer last month

Single name shorters get improved entry point after conviction test
Returning market optimism has taken credit spreads back to ultra-tight levels. But for bears, this posits a better entry level for short trades, and the recent blow-out may have given strong pointers where to target them

Global CLO league tables - October 2020 YTD
Global CLO league tables - October 2020 YTD

OC health check: CLOs wake up when September ends
September showed a slight but clear improvement in CLOs’ over-collateralisation test results as 182 CLOs breached an OC test during the reporting period, compared to 198 in August.

[update] Beneath the triple C: theme parks take portfolios on downward ride
Seven corporate debt issuers were downgraded to triple C or below in September by Moody’s or Standard and Poor’s – hurting $2.16 billion of US CLO loans and €1.16 billion of European CLO portfolio. The pace of CLO loan downgrades to triple C has slowed steadily since the peak in April

Global CLO round-up: fresh start for five year deals as market reopens
The CLO market is still producing deals at a good pace, with $2.6 billion of global issuance last week. Four new issue deals priced in the US with Intermediate Capital Group and NYL Investors pricing their first transactions of the year while CVC Credit Partners made it two and Barings three in 2020

OC health check: August reports slow torrent of fresh breaches to a trickle
198 CLOs reported an over-collateralisation (OC) breach in August, only three of which were completely new breaches. This is a slowdown from July, when 230 deals suffered some kind of OC breach, according to the latest reports from CLO-i  

Global CLO b-wic round-up: dealers get involved amid rally, but dispersion persists
The CLO secondary markets returned to form last week with $716.2 million of US CLO bonds and a further €306.5 million of European CLO paper listed. Although for both markets over half of the total volume listed came from Thursday’s scheduled b-wics

Beneath the triple C: slowest downgrade pace puts market in recovery mode
The CLO market recovery is starting to benefit from borrower downgrades falling to their slowest rate since the coronavirus crisis began in March

Global CLO league tables - August 2020 YTD
Global CLO league tables - August 2020 YTD