AstraZeneca does $6 billion deal; Canadian Railway, Burlington Northern trade mostly flat

By Aleesia Forni and Cristal Cody

Virginia Beach, Nov. 10 – Investment-grade primary activity quieted ahead of the Veterans Day holiday, with only two issuers bringing a combined $7 billion of bonds to market.

The session did see AstraZeneca plc sell $6 billion of senior notes in a five-part offering to help fund its acquisition of ZS Pharma.

All tranches of the new issue came at the tight end of price guidance and between 10 basis points and 15 bps inside initial thoughts.

Meanwhile, KfW priced a $1 billion global note at the tight end of talk.

Combined with Monday’s blowout session, this week has already hosted roughly $22.5 billion of new issuance, closing in on what was predicted to be a $25 billion to $30 billion week.

McDonald’s Corp.’s senior notes (A3/BBB+/BBB+) headed out flat to tighter after Standard & Poor’s downgraded the company’s rating by one notch based on a shareholder capital return plan.

Canadian Pacific Railway Co.’s 2.9% notes due 2025 traded about 1 bp softer with little response in the secondary market to reports the company has contacted Norfolk Southern Corp. for a possible acquisition.

Burlington Northern Santa Fe LLC’s debentures (A3/BBB+) traded flat to about 1 bp weaker over the session.

The Markit CDX North American Investment Grade 25 index ended mostly unchanged at a spread of 81 bps.

© 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.