Portfolio

One of the Obama administration’s priorities is to get Congress to extend the Build America Bond program and federal officials are convinced BABs will remain a “vibrant market” even if the federal subsidy rate is reduced from its current 35% level, a Treasury Department official said ­Monday.

The Toronot company launched a fund that can invest in junk bonds.

An overwhelming majority of Build America Bond subsidy payments have been paid in full to BAB issuers, suggesting that concerns about offsets are dramatically overblown, according to new data on state issuers compiled by the IRS.

Cash continues flooding into municipal bond mutual funds as retail investors embrace yields many once scorned as being far too low. Municipal bond mutual funds that report their figures weekly posted a net inflow of $927.1 million during the week ended Aug. 18, according to Lipper FMI.

Ameriprise eliminates redundancies in mutual fund coverage following its acquisition of Columbia and subsequent merger with it RiverSource investment unit.

Sector has seen net capital withdrawals in seven of the last eight quarters.

When asked whether municipal bonds can continue their record-setting ways, one of the most common refrains from market participants is: "why not?"

The Congressional Budget Office Thursday upped the estimated cost of the Build America Bond program by $10 billion to $36 billion over 10 years in its new estimates on the fiscal 2010 budget deficit and economic outlook.

The Investment Company Institute reported Wednesday that $5.96 billion were added to mutual funds in the week ended August 11. But U.S. equity funds continued to lose ground for a fifth straight week.

The new municipal underwriting group at U.S. Bancorp Investments continues to expand its ranks, adding Leon Bijou as the group's in-house legal counsel last week and securing Bill Bingham to oversee fixed-rate trading this fall.