Moody's releases latest report on high-yield sectors in region
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Moody's Investors Service yesterday released its fifth "Asian High-Yield Compendium", a semi-annual publication that enables investors to compare more easily the financial metrics of 126 high-yield issuers in 28 industries and 14 countries in the region.
Since the end of the global financial crisis in the second quarter of 2009, the Asian high-yield sector has grown steadily, in part fuelled by regional and international bond investors’ quest for increased diversity of holdings and higher yields.
The publication should facilitate investors’ comparisons of Asian high-yield bonds by industry, country and rating category.
From January to June, 44 rated deals closed, raising US$16.8 billion (Bt520 billion), compared with $10.9 billion for all of last year.
Issues from China
While the market has been substantially driven by repeat issuers, Moody’s has also seen the entry of eight newly rated issuers, including seven from China.
“Both new and repeat issuance represent welcome steps to broadening and deepening the regional bond markets, which will aid the overall development of the debt capital markets in Asia, in turn benefiting all participants,” said Laura Acres, senior vice president of Moody’s corporate finance group in Hong Kong.
“While the average tenor for 2013 appears relatively static against 2012 at 5.8 years, this situation belies a clear trend this year of an increased acceptance by investors of seven- and 10-year bond deals, particularly by repeat issuers.
In contrast, the average weighted coupon has shown a clear decline.”
