Moody's Investors Service reports that global speculative-grade defaults rose very slightly last month to 1.7% from 1.6%, notable because the number of bond defaults was the highest in five months and it was the first default by a rated European corporate bond issuer in 15 months, the ratings agency said.
There were three Moody's-rated corporate bond defaulters, including France-based Global Automotive Logistics S.A.S., SGI and Werner Holding Co. SGI was the month's largest defaulter with $258 million in bonds outstanding at default; Werner had $135 million of bonds outstanding and GAL had $127 million outstanding.
For the first five months of 2006, seven corporate bond issuers defaulted on a total of $2.7 billion of bonds, as compared with 13 issuers defaulting on $3.2 billion for the same time period last year.