In finance, a high-yield bond is a bond that is rated below investment grade by credit rating agencies. These bonds have a higher risk of default or other adverse credit events, but offer higher yields than investment-grade bonds in order to compensate for the increased risk.
A credit rating agency is a company that assigns credit ratings, which rate a debtor's ability to pay back debt by making timely principal and interest payments and the likelihood of default. An agency may rate the creditworthiness of issuers of debt obligations, of debt instruments, and in some cases, of the servicers of the underlying debt, but not of individual consumers.
A credit default swap (CDS) is a financial swap agreement that the seller of the CDS will compensate the buyer in the event of a debt default or other credit event. That is, the seller of the CDS insures the buyer against some reference asset defaulting. The buyer of the CDS makes a series of payments to the seller and, in exchange, may expect to receive a payoff if the asset defaults.
Moody's Corporation, often referred to as Moody's, is an American business and financial services company. It is the holding company for Moody's Investors Service (MIS), an American credit rating agency, and Moody's Analytics (MA), an American provider of financial analysis software and services.
The Ambac Financial Group, Inc., generally known as Ambac, is an American holding company. Its subsidiaries provide financial guarantee products such as bond insurance to clients in both the public and private sectors globally. Ambac Assurance is a guarantor of public finance and structured finance obligations. Its common stock and common stock purchase warrants are listed on the NYSE under the symbols AMBC and AMBCW respectively. Ambac is regulated by the insurance commission of Wisconsin. It has its headquarters in Lower Manhattan, New York City.
Moody's Investors Service, often referred to as Moody's, is the bond credit rating business of Moody's Corporation, representing the company's traditional line of business and its historical name. Moody's Investors Service provides international financial research on bonds issued by commercial and government entities. Moody's, along with Standard & Poor's and Fitch Group, is considered one of the Big Three credit rating agencies. It is also included in the Fortune 500 list of 2021.
In investment, the bond credit rating represents the credit worthiness of corporate or government bonds. It is not the same as an individual's credit score. The ratings are published by credit rating agencies and used by investment professionals to assess the likelihood the debt will be repaid.
William Albert Ackman is an American billionaire investor and hedge fund manager. He is the founder and CEO of Pershing Square Capital Management, a hedge fund management company. His investment approach makes him an activist investor. As of 2023, Ackman's net worth was estimated at $3.4 billion by Forbes.
Bond insurance, also known as "financial guaranty insurance", is a type of insurance whereby an insurance company guarantees scheduled payments of interest and principal on a bond or other security in the event of a payment default by the issuer of the bond or security. It is a form of "credit enhancement" that generally results in the rating of the insured security being the higher of (i) the claims-paying rating of the insurer or (ii) the rating the bond would have without insurance.
Berkshire Hathaway Assurance is a bond insurance company created by Berkshire Hathaway, Inc. in December 2007.
Alice Schroeder is an American executive, financial journalist, and author who was Berkshire Hathaway's leading sell-side insurance analyst at Morgan Stanley and later became Warren Buffett's appointed biographer. Schroeder remains a widely-regarded insurance expert, having most recently served as a Non-Executive Director on the Board of Prudential PLC. In the first week of October 2008, she published The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life, a New York Times bestseller. As a project manager for the US Financial Accounting Standards Board, she oversaw the release of SFAS No. 113, a critical change in US reinsurance accounting regulations. Since 2008, Schroeder has worked as a columnist for Bloomberg News.
This article is a subordinate article to the subprime mortgage crisis. It covers some of the miscellaneous effects of the crisis in more detail, to preserve the flow of the main page.
Financial Guaranty Insurance Company (FGIC) is an American monoline bond insurer established in 1983. It faced significant financial difficulties in 2008 which affected its ability to write new business. The firm was acquired in December 2003 by a consortium of investors including PMI Group, The Blackstone Group, The Cypress Group and CIVC Partners.
Reliance Insurance Company, now officially known as Reliance Insurance Company [in Liquidation], was founded in Philadelphia in 1817 and has undergone numerous corporate makeovers in the intervening years. As of October 3, 2001, the company has been in liquidation. As of 2020, Reliance was still in liquidation.
A Credit Derivatives Product Company, or CDPC, is a business focused on trading in credit default swaps contracts. CDPC typically sells insurance against someone failing to pay back a loan ('defaulting'). A CDPC is usually highly leveraged, meaning that if even a portion of its held credit default portfolio were to be 'triggered' at once, the CDPC would not have the capital to fully pay out the resulting insurance claims.
F&G Annuities & Life, Inc., previously known as Fidelity and Guaranty Life Insurance Company is an American financial company, primarily providing annuities and life insurance. The company was founded in 1959 and is based in Des Moines, Iowa.
Financial Security Assurance (FSA) is a financial guaranty insurance company. In 2007, before the 2008 financial crisis, FSA was ranked number four among global monoline credit insurers.
Build America Mutual Assurance Company is a mutual, monoline bond insurer of essential public-purpose U.S. municipal bonds. Since its inception in July 2012, the company has insured more than $65 billion in par amount for more than 3,300 member-issuers. In 2018, it insured $8.36 billion par across 653 new-issue insured transactions. BAM also publishes a credit profile for every transaction it insures and updates them. More than 6,000 are now available. The company is the preferred provider of financial guaranty insurance on debt for member municipalities of the National League of Cities. NLC endorsed BAM upon its launch.
US$154 million (2022)
US$−148 million (2022)