Credit indices hit impasse after US high yield returns to pre-covid tights
Credit improvement looks to be taking a breather on Thursday after the compression play in CDS indices took US high yield index CDX HY to its tightest prints since February 2020, before the outbreak of covid-19 began to blow out spreads

Euro CLO triple As widen as market participants expect spreads to hit 100bp
European CLO triple As are leaking wider with CSAM and KKR resets the latest to demonstrate this - and some anticipate spreads could widen to 100bp, leading to a potential slowdown

AlbaCore swims to €1.5 billion first close on European private debt fund
AlbaCore Capital Group has held a first close on its third European direct lending fund, which has a €2 billion target

CLO triple As drip wider in Europe as CVC prices refi in line with recent new issues
European CLO refinancing triple As have widened with CVC’s Cordatus Loan Fund XIV the latest to price.

Mezz fund is meat and drink to Cerea as it holds €215 million first close
Cerea Partners is targeting companies in the food and beverage value chain as it launches a new mezz fund   

LP round up: big name managers win direct lending mandates amid $1.5 billion allocations
Apollo, Ares, Barings and CVC were among the beneficiaries of the direct lending rush in May 

NatWest CLO plans take hit as head of CLO structuring leaves
NatWest Markets’ goal of expanding its European CLO business has suffered a blow with its head of CLO structuring leaving the bank

Global CLO pricing lab: let’s all point at that 108bp print while spreads leak out
The tsunami of CLO paper coming to market is the biggest technical factor causing spreads to widen, according to sources

Schroders unites private market divisions under Schroders Capital umbrella
Schroders has united its private market capabilities under a new umbrella branded Schroders Capital

Shipping firm adds buoyancy amid few signs of choppiness in credit
CMA CGM, the French container shipping company, is a big mover today amid very calm waters elsewhere in credit.

European CLO manager pushes for platform sale
A boutique European CLO manager has become the latest to look at placing its platform up for sale

BlueBay hires Germany/Austria institutional sales official in new role
BlueBay Asset Management has tapped a former bfinance official as head of institutional sales Germany and Austria, a newly created job

Credit fundraising: Audax scores big in lighter month
Fundraising markedly dropped in May, but credit funds still amassed $12.8 billion and 10 credit funds reached final closes across a variety of different strategies

Novicap tech platform targets credit investors with fundraising drive
Novicap, a fintech company offering working capital optimisation solutions to SMEs and mid-market corporates, is looking to debt capital markets participants such as credit and structured credit funds, asset managers, pension companies and insurers as it seeks to raise third-party funding for its credit platform

Euro refi CLO triple As hit 78bp - 1bp wider than 5yr deal in March
Cairn Capital partially refinanced its 2018 European CLO Cairn CLO X, highlighting the widening trend in triple As but tightening in mezz refi notes

"Technology won’t replace human judgement. In ESG a qualitative review is necessary"
The social aspect of ESG must be given sufficient weight in investment decisions  

"In the afternoon I awoke from a pile of willow leaves to discover we had created a Welsh ether-based token"
A localised crypto-currency boom and bust cycle teaches Welshcake (again) that everything becomes correlated in a downturn  

Tech firm tempts credit investors with supply chain finance offer
Novicap, a fintech company focused on invoice financing, is looking to debt capital market participants — such as credit and structured credit funds, asset managers, pension companies and insurers — as it seeks to raise third-party funding for its credit platform

Euro CLO league tables: out with the old, in with the new as Jefferies leads way
Despite being a newcomer to the European CLO market this year, Jefferies has taken the market by storm and leads the way in overall European CLO issuance

Global CLO league tables - May 2021 YTD
Global CLO league tables - May 2021 YTD

No labels mean CLO triple As refuse to budge as mezz rallies
Senior European CLO spreads are stuck in the mid 80s as mezzanine tranches rally, with market participants bemoaning the lack of depth in the triple A investor base relative to ABS products

Elfa adds to ESG fact sheet range in standardisation drive
The European Leveraged Finance Association (Elfa) will shortly publish sector-specific fact sheets for the transport and healthcare industries, sources say, bringing its total of ESG fact sheets to 12

Lupus Alpha CLO funds bounce over 100% in year-long rise
Lupus Alpha’s CLO funds have posted 100%-plus returns in the past 12 months, with Lupus Alpha CLO Opportunity Notes II up 137.24%

European CLO managers bake in triple C flexibility
Three European CLO managers are understood to have embedded language in post-covid CLO documentation that affords them flexibility in managing triple Cs, according to market sources

Managers offer solutions for underfunded pensions
Credit managers are tapping UK defined benefit pensions that are battling negative cashflows