Work sharing is becoming more common in the US:
Instead of dismissal notices, employees get a shortened work week, with unemployment benefits partially compensating for lost wages. Popularly known as work sharing, the program holds out the promise of fewer layoffs and less painful economic downturns.
…
While work share can be useful, policymakers and businesses need to proceed with caution, said Douglas Holmes, president of UWC-Strategic Services on Unemployment & Workers’ Compensation, a Washington-based business group that lobbies on unemployment insurance issues. The programs could drain already stressed unemployment insurance funds and, if used inappropriately, could delay inevitable economic disruptions, he said.One reason Blue Crown cites for the drop in orders, for example, is that more dentists are sending work to China.
“If an individual continues to do the same job because this policy permits them to, when they would be better off spending time improving their skills doing the next job, that’s a factor that has to be taken into consideration,” Holmes said. “That turns the program from being a temporary measure to address a fluctuation in demand into one that becomes a long- term wage subsidy.”
At Blue Crown, where the least-experienced dental technician makes $17.50 an hour, orders still haven’t bounced back and co-owner Roberts is applying for her third year of work share.
Liquidity is becoming more important in US corporate bond pricing:
Investors’ preference for the most- liquid corporate debt is running higher than any time since the credit crisis, a signal they’re preparing for the four-year rally to end.
The expense incurred by credit traders to complete bond transactions was the lowest last year relative to costs implied by the market’s average bid-ask spread since 2009, according to Barclays Plc. The shift, a sign that buyers are favoring securities that are easiest to trade, has helped financial bonds beat industrial debt by the biggest margin on record, Bank of America Merrill Lynch index data show.
…
Buyers are seeking flexibility as a 6 percent increase in trading volumes fails to keep up with a 13 percent rise in the size of the dollar-denominated market, data from Bloomberg and Bank of America Merrill Lynch show.The average daily volume of bonds changing hands last year accounted for 0.29 percent of outstanding debt, the lowest proportion since at least 2005, according to data compiled by Bloomberg and Trace.
The 21 primary dealers with the Federal Reserve, which traditionally used their own money to facilitate trading, have reduced their corporate-bond inventories 76 percent since October 2007 to $57.49 billion, Bloomberg data show.
US housing horror stories never seem to end:
Six years in, thousands of homeowners are finding themselves legally liable for houses they didn’t know they still owned after banks decided it wasn’t worth their while to complete foreclosures on them. With impunity, banks have been walking away from foreclosures much the way some homeowners walked away from their mortgages when the housing market first crashed.
“The banks are just deciding not to foreclose, even though the homeowners never caught up with their payments,” says Daren Blomquist, vice-president at RealtyTrac, a real-estate information company in Irvine, California.
FTN.PR.A was confirmed at Pfd-4(high) by DBRS:
Over the past year, the performance of the Portfolio experienced some volatility, with the month-end NAV of the Company fluctuating between $18.07 and $19.02 per unit. The current dividend coverage ratio is around 0.66, but the Company has also written covered call options in order to generate additional income for distributions. The rating of Pfd-4 (high) is sufficient based on the current level of downside protection available to the Preferred Shares. As a result, the rating has been confirmed at Pfd-4 (high).
It was a mixed day for the Canadian preferred share market, with PerpetualPremiums up 8bp, FixedResets off 1bp and DeemedRetractibles gaining 3bp. Volatility was low. Volume was significantly above average.
| HIMIPref™ Preferred Indices These values reflect the December 2008 revision of the HIMIPref™ Indices Values are provisional and are finalized monthly |
|||||||
| Index | Mean Current Yield (at bid) |
Median YTW |
Median Average Trading Value |
Median Mod Dur (YTW) |
Issues | Day’s Perf. | Index Value |
| Ratchet | 0.00 % | 0.00 % | 0 | 0.00 | 0 | 0.3599 % | 2,494.0 |
| FixedFloater | 4.25 % | 3.62 % | 29,582 | 18.00 | 1 | 0.0000 % | 3,785.6 |
| Floater | 2.79 % | 3.01 % | 55,807 | 19.71 | 4 | 0.3599 % | 2,692.9 |
| OpRet | 4.62 % | -4.82 % | 51,810 | 0.39 | 4 | 0.0953 % | 2,601.7 |
| SplitShare | 4.60 % | 4.57 % | 44,130 | 4.34 | 2 | 0.0200 % | 2,893.2 |
| Interest-Bearing | 0.00 % | 0.00 % | 0 | 0.00 | 0 | 0.0953 % | 2,379.0 |
| Perpetual-Premium | 5.26 % | 0.45 % | 75,396 | 0.75 | 30 | 0.0769 % | 2,343.9 |
| Perpetual-Discount | 4.82 % | 4.83 % | 132,628 | 15.79 | 4 | -0.1211 % | 2,660.6 |
| FixedReset | 4.92 % | 2.95 % | 209,779 | 3.61 | 78 | -0.0099 % | 2,472.4 |
| Deemed-Retractible | 4.87 % | -0.72 % | 111,368 | 0.30 | 46 | 0.0345 % | 2,435.7 |
| Performance Highlights | |||
| Issue | Index | Change | Notes |
| GWO.PR.N | FixedReset | -1.63 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Hard Maturity Maturity Date : 2022-01-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 22.96 Bid-YTW : 4.20 % |
| TRI.PR.B | Floater | 1.47 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Limit Maturity Maturity Date : 2043-01-10 Maturity Price : 22.55 Evaluated at bid price : 22.80 Bid-YTW : 2.28 % |
| Volume Highlights | |||
| Issue | Index | Shares Traded |
Notes |
| BMO.PR.P | FixedReset | 205,027 | RBC crossed blocks of 150,000 and 40,000, both at 27.11. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2015-02-25 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 27.11 Bid-YTW : 1.68 % |
| TRP.PR.A | FixedReset | 172,354 | RBC crossed blocks of 88,000 shares, 39,079 and 14,660, all at 25.65, then sold 10,000 to anonymous at 25.67. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2014-12-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 25.67 Bid-YTW : 3.27 % |
| CM.PR.L | FixedReset | 167,734 | RBC crossed 100,000 at 26.45; National crossed 61,000 at the same price. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2014-04-30 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 26.38 Bid-YTW : 1.92 % |
| TRP.PR.B | FixedReset | 136,912 | Nesbitt crossed blocks of 59,840 and 48,472, both at 24.45. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Limit Maturity Maturity Date : 2043-01-10 Maturity Price : 23.26 Evaluated at bid price : 24.43 Bid-YTW : 2.87 % |
| MFC.PR.B | Deemed-Retractible | 95,920 | RBC crossed blocks of 26,265 and 37,219, both at 25.00. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Hard Maturity Maturity Date : 2022-01-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 24.95 Bid-YTW : 4.74 % |
| BMO.PR.H | Deemed-Retractible | 91,597 | National crossed 18,700 at 25.45; TD crossed 70,000 at the same price. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2013-02-25 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 25.39 Bid-YTW : -1.75 % |
| There were 38 other index-included issues trading in excess of 10,000 shares. | |||
| Wide Spread Highlights | ||
| Issue | Index | Quote Data and Yield Notes |
| PWF.PR.K | Perpetual-Premium | Quote: 25.36 – 26.00 Spot Rate : 0.6400 Average : 0.3766 YTW SCENARIO |
| GWO.PR.N | FixedReset | Quote: 22.96 – 23.55 Spot Rate : 0.5900 Average : 0.4029 YTW SCENARIO |
| PWF.PR.M | FixedReset | Quote: 25.74 – 26.15 Spot Rate : 0.4100 Average : 0.2846 YTW SCENARIO |
| ENB.PR.F | FixedReset | Quote: 25.49 – 25.70 Spot Rate : 0.2100 Average : 0.1351 YTW SCENARIO |
| TCA.PR.X | Perpetual-Premium | Quote: 51.80 – 52.10 Spot Rate : 0.3000 Average : 0.2313 YTW SCENARIO |
| MFC.PR.H | FixedReset | Quote: 26.40 – 26.62 Spot Rate : 0.2200 Average : 0.1543 YTW SCENARIO |