Bear Stearns High Yield Index finishes week with 7.0% year-to-date return

By Paul A. Harris

St. Louis, Sept. 29 - The Bear Stearns High Yield Index has returned 7.0% for the year to Sept. 28.

For the month to that date, the index return is up 1.23%.

During the most recent week, the yield to worst widened by 28 basis points to 8.70%. Over the same period the yield-to-worst spread also widened by 32 bps to 409 bps.

For the month to Sept. 28, all 12 of the index industry sectors showed positive returns.

The telecommunications sector's 1.70% month-to-date return renders it the outperformer with just one market session remaining in September, boosting its year-to-date return to 6.87%.

Telecommunications' ESMR & PCS component led the advance with 3.78% for the month to Sept. 29 - the best by far among all industry subsectors during September, driving its year-to-date return to 5.62%.

However, the telecommunications sector's star performer for 2006 has been its long distance component. Its 17.99% return is second only to that of the transportation sector's airlines component, which has generated 24.56%, the greatest return among all subsectors for the year to Sept. 29.

Airlines, though, represents only 0.08% of the Bear Stearns High Yield Index composite, while long distance makes up 0.60%.

Third place among the industry subsectors for the year to Sept. 29 is the consumer cyclical sector's automobile manufacturing-related component, which at 16.91% year to date trails long distance by 100 bps and change.

However, the automobile manufacturing related subsector comprises 14.66% of the Bear Stearns index composite, dwarfing all of the other subsectors in the index.

The aforementioned transportation sector's 0.12% return for the month renders it the underperformer for the period among industry sectors. To Sept. 29, transportation's return for the year was 8.37%.

The health care sector's services-diagnostic component turned in the worst performance for the month at negative 4.52%. Its year-to-date return, negative 8.33%, is also the worst among the subsectors for the year to Sept. 29.

To Sept. 28, the index had a market value of $577.62 billion, and the issue count stood at 1,644 issues.

© 2015 Prospect News.
All content on this website is protected by copyright law in the U.S. and elsewhere. For the use of the person downloading only.
Redistribution and copying are prohibited by law without written permission in advance from Prospect News.
Redistribution or copying includes e-mailing, printing multiple copies or any other form of reproduction.