We saw the recent positive sentiment in the high yield market extend over this past week. Oil prices have bounced from their February lows, and high yield bonds and equities with it, with both markets up about 1.5% on the week. The Bank of America High-Yield Index (BAML) yield and spread again tightened this week, closing down 40bps and 43bps over the week, now at 9.16% and +780bps, respectively.

For the week ending February 24^th, Lipper reported an inflow of $2.7billion into high yield mutual and exchange traded funds, the third positive inflow in a row. This week’s inflow was the largest that we have seen in eighteen weeks. The new issue market continued move forward, with a slight improvement over last week as five deals priced for $2.0bil in proceeds.

The Bank of America Merrill Lynch High Yield Index monitors the performance of below investment grade U.S. dollar-denominated corporate bonds publicly issued in the U.S. domestic market.  Index data sourced from Bloomberg. BAML HY represents the index yield for the designated date, while return/change represent the index return for the period ending date. Yield referenced is the yield-to-worst and spread referenced is the spread-to-worst.