Trump Win Boosts Demand for Credit, With Spreads at 1998 Low

(Bloomberg) -- Investors are pouring money into US corporate bonds after Donald Trump won the US presidential election, stocks surged, and the Federal Reserve cut rates again, pushing risk premiums to their lowest levels in more than 25 years.

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Average US investment-grade bond spreads, the extra yield over US Treasuries that investors get paid to hold riskier debt, narrowed two basis points to 75 at Thursday’s close, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That’s the tightest level since May 1998.

“Spreads haven’t been this low in the career of most professionals,” said Andrew Hofer, head of taxable fixed income at Brown Brothers Harriman & Co.

Junk spreads, meanwhile, reached a three-year low of 265 basis points on Wednesday, before retracing a bit to 267 basis points on Thursday.

The growing exuberance stems from hopes that Trump will cut corporate taxes and reduce regulation. On top of that, yields have climbed since late September, boosting demand from yield-driven investors like pension funds, while giving companies less incentive to sell bonds now.

While concerns that Trump’s policies may reignite inflation have pushed up bond yields over the last month, investors for now are seizing on that opportunity to lock in the higher payouts in credit as they await more details on his plans, including trade tariffs.

‘Undeniable’ Strength

The end of election uncertainty should be “bullish” for high-grade spreads for the rest of this year, Bank of America strategists including Yuri Seliger wrote in a note Wednesday. JPMorgan Chase & Co., meanwhile, revised its year-end forecast for US investment-grade bond spreads lower, citing “undeniable” strength of the credit market’s technical backdrop.

A swift election resolution and higher Treasury yields will likely further boost already-robust demand for credit, analysts Bradley Rogoff and Dominique Toublan wrote in a note Friday.

Many investors are buying based on the absolute levels of yields now, said Sheldon Chan, a portfolio manager for Asia credit at T. Rowe Price Group in Hong Kong. For money managers with obligations to fund, such as pensions, spreads don’t matter as much, allowing them to keep buying even as risk premiums fall.

“We’ve seen that pattern really play out over the course of the last few weeks, where even though US Treasury yields have been going higher and higher, credit spreads really have absorbed that,” Chan said. “And that dynamic is true both in developed-market and in emerging-market credit.”

(Updates to add context from strategists.)

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