A Pragmatist’s Guide to Leveraged Finance: Credit Analysis for Bonds and Bank Debt

1. Introduction

What’s in this chapter:

• What the market is

• How companies become part of the leveraged finance market

• Unique aspects of leveraged finance credit analysis

• The two starting points of credit analysis

The high-yield leveraged bond and loan market is over $2.3 trillion in North America, about € 650 billion in Europe, and $600 billion in emerging markets—and it’s still growing. Perhaps you want to manage money in this sector, sell, trade, work as a banker, be a credit analyst, work in capital markets or credit default swaps, or work as an advisor. Or maybe you work in the finance department of a company that issues this debt. Whatever the case, the basic skills of credit analysis are key to being able to operate effectively. ...