Global Investing

How good was 2012 for bond markets? Very good, by the look of the many records broken.

2012  was the strongest year for global high yield and investment grade debt on record, new issuance of corporate debt from emerging markets issuers was also the strongest since records began in 1980 and activity on global debt capital markets were overall up 10 percent from 2011, Thomson Reuters data shows.

Euro-denominated international corporate debt increased 69.5 percent, making 2012 issuance the second largest on record behind 2009.

According to Thomson Reuters’ report on debt capital markets in 2012:

Overall global debt capital markets activity totaled US$5.6 trillion during full year 2012, a 10% increase from the comparable period in 2011 and the strongest annual period for global debt capital markets activity since 2009.

The volume of global high yield corporate debt reached US$389.0 billion during full year 2012, a 38% increase compared to full year 2011 and the strongest annual period for high yield debt activity since records began in 1980. High yield issuance during the fourth quarter of 2012 totaled US$113.2 billion, narrowly surpassing the third quarter of 2012 and setting an all-time quarterly record.

The Olympic medals have all been handed out and the athletes are on their way home.  Which countries surpassed expectations and which ones did worse than expected? And did this have anything to do with the state of their economies?

An extensive Goldman Sachs report entitled Olympics and Economics  (a regular feature before each Olympic Games) predicted before the Games kicked off that the United States would top the tally with 36 gold medals. It also said the top 10 would include five G7 countries (the United States, Great Britain, France, Germany and Italy), two BRICs (China and Russia), one of the developing countries it dubs Next-11  (South Korea), and one additional developed and emerging market. These would be Australia and Ukraine, it said.

Close enough, except that Hungary took the place of Ukraine as the emerging economy in the Top 10 and the United States actually took 46 gold medals — more than Goldman had predicted.