Fifth Third’s notes join Masco’s crossover issue in primary; Apple, IBM, Cisco unchanged

By Cristal Cody and Aleesia Forni

New York, March 10 – The investment-grade primary saw another slowed session on Thursday.

The market took a pause as the European Central Bank cut its main interest rate to zero and its bank deposit rate to minus 0.4% and expanded its quantitative easing program to €80 billion from €60 billion.

Just two new deals entered the primary market, a $1.5 billion two-part offering from Fifth Third Bank and a $900 million split-rated offering from Masco Corp.

Fifth Third nabbed an order book that was nearly 3.5 times oversubscribed, bringing in spreads by 17.5 basis points to 37 bps compared to initial thoughts.

This pushes the week’s total supply to $32 billion.

Investment-grade bonds were mostly unchanged in secondary trading on Thursday. Credit spreads opened the day 5 bps tighter and firmed an additional 1 bp over the session.

The Markit CDX North American Investment Grade index closed the day 6 bps tighter at a spread of 91 bps.

Apple Inc.’s 3.25% senior notes due 2026 (Aa1/AA+) were flat on the day but traded about 2 bps better on the week.

International Business Machines Corp.’s 3.45% senior notes due 2026 (Aa3/A-/A+) were stable over the session and nearly 10 bps tighter since Monday.

Cisco Systems, Inc.’s 2.95% senior notes due 2026 were unchanged going out in secondary trading and about 7 bps tighter over the week.

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