Municipal Bond News

Market News Commentary - From The Desk of David Loesch 01.16.2020

Submitted by Tax Free Municipal Bonds/Fixed Income Specialists/DRL Group on January 16th, 2020

Submitted by Tax Free Municipal Bonds/Fixed Income Specialists/DRL Group on January 8th, 2020

Bank of America was the top underwriter of MUNI bonds in 2019 as the value of deals rose 26%. State and local governments sold 406.4B of MUNI’s verses 321B in 2018.

Submitted by Tax Free Municipal Bonds/Fixed Income Specialists/DRL Group on December 31st, 2019

With the Iran issues looming, futures are down slightly and would probably be down more if it were not for the “day.” This is an issue that will cause problems for the markets if it gets out of hand.

Submitted by Tax Free Municipal Bonds/Fixed Income Specialists/DRL Group on December 26th, 2019

The largest state pension plans are reducing their investment portfolios in equities and moving into Fixed Income Securities. With the turmoil surrounding pensions over the past few years, many states are seeking less volatile paper. This interest will be a plus to our markets in 2020.

Submitted by Tax Free Municipal Bonds/Fixed Income Specialists/DRL Group on December 18th, 2019

Submitted by Tax Free Municipal Bonds/Fixed Income Specialists/DRL Group on December 11th, 2019

A proposed 15B CA ballot measure that would authorize the most significant school construction bond in the state's history will be on moved to November 2022 - this is interesting based on how low the rates are now. The bankers indicated that they did not want it to conflict with other measures; however I find it interesting that many of these bankers (JP Morgan one of them) fee

Submitted by Tax Free Municipal Bonds/Fixed Income Specialists/DRL Group on December 5th, 2019

Submitted by Tax Free Municipal Bonds/Fixed Income Specialists/DRL Group on November 21st, 2019

As the presidential race heats up, Democratic Rep Cortez and Schakowsky are working on legislation that would nearly double the top individual US tax rate to 59% on the highest incomes. The bill, which is still in the drafting stages, would increase the cap gains tax. If the Democrats have any presence in our upcoming election, I would expect our markets to gain.
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Submitted by Tax Free Municipal Bonds/Fixed Income Specialists/DRL Group on November 14th, 2019

Taxable MUNI's continue to make headlines; there was an article in the WSJ and BB about Overseas Buyers sucking up taxable muni's. Zurich is the largest buyer, along with Mellon investments. With the unprecedented negative returns in Europe, this is has become a very attractive asset class.
Requests for CUSIP's last month were at an accelerated pace, sho

Submitted by Tax Free Municipal Bonds/Fixed Income Specialists/DRL Group on November 7th, 2019

Wall Street is not excited about the tax- the- rich push, which is front and center in the Democrats' efforts to unseat Trump. If this happens, the value of Tax-Exempt bonds will move up based on the income tax treatment. MUNI's delivered outsized returns during the Clinton years when the top rate marginal tax rate was higher than where it is now. Even though th