FICC Focus

To illustrate how uniquely challenging the restructuring experience is for the unacquainted, C Street Advisory Group founder and CEO Jon Henes recalled a client CEO’s sentiment after complex, hardball restructuring negotiations: “Every time we walk into a room ... I feel like I’m in one big game of poker. Except you know what your cards are and you know what my cards are and you know what everybod...

Darrell Duffie, the Adams Distinguished Professor of Management and Finance at Stanford Graduate School of Business, joins Bloomberg Intelligence’s Ira Jersey on this Macro Matters edition of the FICC Focus podcast to discuss how much the Federal Reserve can realistically shrink its balance sheet under Chair Kevin Warsh. Duffie argues that the real constraint isn’t on the asset side, but on the li...

In this episode of FX Moment, Bloomberg Intelligence Chief FX Strategist Audrey Childe-Freeman and Win Thin, chief economist at Bank of Nassau 1982 Limited, discuss the US dollar outlook into 2H. They acknowledge the return of economics and yields as key FX drivers which implies that dollar strength may be the path of least resistance, at least in 3Q, and for as long as US...

Credit and high yield recovered all losses due to the Iran war in 2Q. Will 3Q keep delivering gains, and why? Mahesh Bhimalingam, Bloomberg Intelligence global head of credit strategy, discusses the results of the BI 3Q26 Investor Survey and the market outlook with David Fancourt, High Yield Fund Manager at M&G Investments. They discuss valuations and central bank actions, along with distress and...

“When you just think about the distribution of outcomes on corporate bonds from these levels of spreads, the cost of getting a few of them wrong can wipe out a quarter, or even a year of alpha in these sort of lower-return opportunity type environments,” says Connor Fitzgerald, fixed income portfolio manager for Wellington Management. Fitzgerald joins Bloomberg Intelligence’s Noel Hebert on this e...

Global credit markets swung through war and peace, making strategic insights essential for the second half of the year. Bloomberg Intelligence’s credit strategists have their sights set on 2H, but what do their outlooks hold? In this episode of the Credit Crunch podcast, Mahesh Bhimalingam, Bloomberg Intelligence’s global head of credit strategy, hosts BI’s global credit strategy team to discuss k...

Bloomberg Intelligence Chief European Rates Strategist Huw Worthington joins Ira Jersey on this Macro Matters edition of the FICC Focus podcast to discuss the latest moves from the European Central Bank, the Bank of England and global rate markets. Worthington explains why the ECB’s recent rate hike may already look too aggressive now that oil and gas prices have fallen back, and why the market ma...

“LLMs give us the opportunity to kind of rethink how much expected skill we can get out of our tools and techniques,” says Jeffrey Rosenberg, managing director and senior fixed income portfolio manager for BlackRock Systematic. “If deep fundamental value investing is dedicating 10,000 hours to create ... concentrated portfolios based on an expectation of high degrees of skill, maybe we can do some...

Emerging market credit index futures improve liquidity and balance-sheet efficiency, yet they also open the door to a wider range of tactical and relative-value trading opportunities. Lee Bartholomew, global head of derivative markets at Deutsche Börse, joins Damian Sassower, Bloomberg Intelligence’s chief EM fixed income strategist, to assess the evolution of Eurex-listed EM credit index futures,...

With Kevin Warsh’s first meeting as Federal Reserve chair behind him, the discourse can move to what it signals for monetary policy. Bloomberg Economics Chief US Economist Anna Wong joins Ira Jersey on this edition of Macro Matters and argues that while Warsh avoided explicit forward guidance, his emphasis was on price stability, skepticism toward forecast precision and support for a shorter polic...

This edition of the All Options Considered podcast features a recording from the Bloomberg Volatility Forum held in Singapore on June 3. Bloomberg Intelligence’s Alison Williams, head of global strategy, delivers opening remarks, followed by a keynote presentation from Chief Global Derivatives Strategist Tanvir Sandhu on multi-asset volatility strategy. The program also includes a panel discussion...

“If there’s kind of a squeamishness about forum shopping in the US, there’s a little...it’s just overseas, there’s none at all,” observed Harvard Law Professor Jared Ellias. “There’s a great deal of pride and interest in building...an insolvency system that is equal and in some ways more useful than what they have in the United States.” Ellias sat down with Bloomberg Intelligence analysts Negisa B...

JPMorgan Asset Management sees a resilient economy facing multiple supply shocks, with inflation still largely supply-led and the Federal Reserve likely to remain on hold for now. Priya Misra, fixed-income portfolio manager at the firm and a manager of the JPMorgan Core Plus Bond ETF (JCPB Equity), joins Ira Jersey, Bloomberg Intelligence chief US interest-rate strategist, on this Macro Matters ed...

Credit continues to rally despite the lack of a US-Iran peace deal, and it has served as a safe haven relative to rates. In this Credit Crunch podcast, host Mahesh Bhimalingam, global head of credit strategy at Bloomberg Intelligence, and Souheir Asba, credit portfolio manager at AllianceBernstein, discuss how hyperscaler issuance and upcoming IPOs could affect the credit landscape through index a...

Emerging markets are becoming a strategic focus for creditors looking to extract the complexity premium embedded in local markets. Atanas Bostandjiev, chairman and founder of Gemcorp Capital Management, joins Damian Sassower, Bloomberg Intelligence’s chief EM fixed income strategist, to assess the opportunities available to institutional investors with perpetual capital. Bostandjiev and Sassower d...

Supply shocks, inflation risks and AI are reshaping the investment landscape, a theme that Lazard’s Chief Investment Officer Eric Van Nostrand discusses with Ira Jersey on this Macro Matters edition of the FICC Focus podcast. Van Nostrand explains why macro matters more to markets now than it did for much of the past two decades, and why investors need to focus more on supply dynamics than traditi...

Recent euro-dollar price action has validated structural euro-dollar bulls, with the case for diversification strategies beyond the dollar still holding as we look to 2H and 2027. Yet this view is increasingly at risk from an evolving cyclical narrative, with an outperforming US economy and the potential for a hawkish tilt from the Federal Reserve likely to revive cyclical euro-dollar bears into 2...

“There’s such an informational asymmetry between incumbent investors — the direct lenders who are in the deal and the sponsor — and new parties that it can be harder to bridge that bid-ask,” said Ensis Partners Co-Founder Richard Shinder, “Price transparency acts as a signal... and if you don’t have that price signal, that can be a deterrent to getting things done.” Shinder shared valuable insight...

Oil prices have become the key driver of global rates markets as conflict in the Middle East reshapes inflation expectations and policy outlooks. Matt Hornbach, Morgan Stanley’s global head of macro strategy, joins Ira Jersey, Bloomberg Intelligence chief US interest-rate strategist, on this Macro Matters edition of the FICC Focus podcast. Hornbach explains why energy prices have been the dominant...

Dispersion is rising across emerging markets, reflecting differences in external balances, policy flexibility and economic proximity to the war in Iran. Pablo Goldberg, EM fixed income portfolio manager at BlackRock, joins Damian Sassower, Bloomberg Intelligence’s chief EM fixed income strategist, to assess institutional positioning and investor sentiment across the asset class, as real yields are...

“I’ve been shocked by the attention the issue as far as my mediating cases that are before me has gotten because in my view it’s just a label,” US Bankruptcy Judge Michael Kaplan said, addressing the scrutiny surrounding his role as a mediator in cases pending before him. Bankruptcy judges “have always brought parties into chambers in an effort to settle matters when it’s consensual.” In a convers...

“You have a refinancing problem; that’s the dynamic that we’re in today. With the covenant-lite nature of the loan market, most of these better-quality businesses can orchestrate an extension one time,” said Jason Mudrick, founder and chief investment officer of Mudrick Capital Management. “The problem is when you get to that new post-LME maturity wall, it’s going to be much more challenging if we...

Rising Treasury yields, war-driven inflation concerns and uncertainty over the Federal Reserve are reshaping the fixed-income outlook. George Catrambone, head of fixed income for the Americas at DWS Group, joins Ira Jersey, Bloomberg Intelligence chief US interest-rate strategist, on this Macro Matters edition of the FICC Focus podcast. Catrambone discusses why the move higher in long-end Treasury...

“The key to longevity in lending is really avoiding principal loss, minimizing principal loss,” says Richard Miller, chief investment officer of TCW’s Private Credit Group. Reduced distress has led to less demand for restructuring and recovery-optimization skill sets in recent years, but “it really feels like in the next four or five [years]... those characteristics are going to be important for p...

Heightened geopolitical risk is driving asset price fluctuations, as inflation and interest rate uncertainty demands increased focus on risk management and liquidity. Andrew Jackson, head of investments at Vontobel, joins Damian Sassower, Bloomberg Intelligence’s chief EM fixed income strategist, to assess portfolio exposure and investor sentiment across emerging market debt, as the asset class is...