High yield 'lite': More issuers offering terms closer to IG than HY

Christine Tadros, head of European research at Xtract Research, highlights the key trends that have been seen in the first half of 2015, and which are likely to impact the market in the coming months

Market participants will surely concur that activity in the European primary high yield debt capital markets has been decidedly fitful in the first half of this eventful year.  Customarily, most bonds issued on the European high yield market have (at least purportedly) ranked as first priority senior secured debt instruments. Nevertheless, we observed a noteworthy shift in the first half of 2015, during which the majority of senior bonds have been unsecured.  Only 10% of European high yield bond deals during the period featured a portable capital qualification in the change of control...