CAM High Yield Weekly Insights

Fund Flows & Issuance: According to Wells Fargo, flows week to date were $0.5 billion and year to date flows stand at $8 billion. New issuance for the week was $2.3 billion and year to date HY is at $40 billion.

(Reuters) Sinclair approaches Tribune Media about possible deal

• A deal between Sinclair and Tribune Media, which have market capitalizations of $3.8 billion and $3.3 billion respectively, would combine two of the largest U.S. local TV station owners and face regulatory curbs on how many households they can reach
• Analysts have said the broadcast industry hopes President Donald Trump will lift caps on ownership concentration, allowing it to compete for audiences and advertising dollars against Facebook Inc and Alphabet Inc’s Google
• The discussions between the companies are preliminary and there is no certainty they will lead to any deal, the sources said

(Business Wire) Frontier Communications Reports Financial Results

• Dan McCarthy, President and CEO, stated, “During the quarter we made significant progress in positioning our company to deliver a better customer experience and improved financial performance, with greater financial flexibility. Our reorganization into separate Commercial and Consumer business units will result in a more customer-centric approach, while reducing expenses and enabling more efficient capital deployment.”
• “Results for the fourth quarter were impacted by our intensified efforts to resolve acquired accounts in California, Texas and Florida that we have determined to be non-paying. This process is almost complete, and we expect to return to a normalized trend by the start of the second quarter. I am pleased that underlying CTF customer trends improved in Q4 and continue to improve in Q1.”

(Business Wire) Intelsat and OneWeb Announce Conditional Combination Agreement

• Intelsat and OneWeb today announced that they have entered into a definitive combination agreement pursuant to which Intelsat and OneWeb will merge in a share-for-share transaction. Intelsat and SoftBank Group also entered into a definitive share purchase agreement pursuant to which SoftBank will invest $1.7 billion in newly issued common and preferred shares of the combined company
• Both the merger and the SoftBank investment are subject to, among other conditions, successful completion of debt exchange offers to certain existing Intelsat bondholders as well as receipt of certain regulatory approvals

(Industrial Distribution) U.S. Oil Rig Count Now Above 600, Up 50% Year-Over-Year

• The U.S. total active rig count made a small gain last week, adding three total. It was the sixth straight week the combined oil and gas rig total has increased. Friday’s rig count provided by oilfield services provider Baker Hughes, checked in at 754 — its highest since Nov. 20, 2015. The total is up by 50.2 percent from a year earlier, and up 86.6 percent since bottoming out at 404 in May 2016
• The U.S. added five oil rigs last week, pushing its current mark to 602. It was the sixth straight week that the oil rig count has grown, and the 16th week in the past 17. The U.S. lost two gas rigs last week, marking just the second week of decline in the past 16. The active gas rig count of 151
• Texas once again dominated the overall rig count gain last week, adding eight to a total of 386. That figure is up 67.1 percent year-over-year. Wyoming added one rig, Alaska and Louisiana each lost two and North Dakota lost one

(Business Wire) AES Corp. Reports Financial Results

• Overall results reflected the impact from the devaluation in foreign currencies, lower electricity prices, certain gains that benefited 2015 results and higher non-cash impairment losses, partially offset by a lower effective tax rate
• Consolidated Net Cash Provided by Operating Activities for full year 2016 was $2,884 million, an increase of $750 million compared to full year 2015. The increase was primarily driven by higher collections at the Company’s distribution businesses in Brazil, Eletropaulo and Sul, and the settlement of overdue receivables at Maritza in Bulgaria. These positive contributions were offset by lower margins across the SBUs, as well as the recovery of overdue receivables in the Dominican Republic in 2015, which benefited 2015 results. Full Year 2016 Proportional Free Cash Flow (a non-GAAP financial measure) increased $176 million to $1,417 million compared to full year 2015, primarily due to the same factors as Consolidated Net Cash Provided by Operating Activities
• “We ended 2016 on a high note, achieving our guidance for all metrics, with cash flow coming in at the high end, and Adjusted EPS well within, our ranges. We also continued to make strides on our strategic objectives by completing 3 GW of construction projects, selling non-core assets and making further cost cuts and revenue enhancements,” said Andrés Gluski, AES President and Chief Executive Officer. “The recent purchase of sPower increases our long-term contracted, U.S. Dollar-denominated, renewable portfolio, which was one of our stated objectives for 2016.”