Bunny money: issuers and investors gorge on Easter feast

Lent appeared to end early in the bond markets this week as issuers across the credit spectrum brought a rash of deals, leaving encouraging markers for the weeks ahead. By recent standards of market dysfunction, issuers have been quicker to come back to the market than some would have expected. But were these Easter eggs all they cracked up to be?

Certainly, issuance resumed after the hiatus caused by the demise of Silicon Valley Bank and Credit Suisse last week but it powered up a notch since as big eurozone banks entered the fray, well rated corporates issued deals and even high yield issuers priced bonds. But we took a closer look at how these deals performed and how well investors digested the feast to give a health assessment of the capital markets. We also looked ahead to what could quash the positive feeling that drove issuance this week.

Among those items on the worry list is, of course, the banking crisis that has dominated the markets for the last month. We talk not only about whether it is over but whether it is even right to call it a crisis in the first place.