junk bond

Related to junk bond: Investment grade bond

junk bond

A corporate bond that has a high yield but also carries a low rating and high risk of default. They were making huge profits trading junk bonds, but then the market collapsed and they were stuck with worthless securities they couldn't get rid of.
See also: bond, junk
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

junk bond

n. a low-rated corporate bond that pays higher interest because of greater risk. (Parallel to junk food.) Don’t put all your money into junk bonds.
See also: bond, junk
McGraw-Hill's Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions
See also:
  • be as high as a kite
  • set (one's) sights high
  • set your sights high/low
  • the heat is on
  • high and low
  • ride high
  • riding high
  • near and dear to (one)
  • have a high opinion of (someone or something)
  • in high gear
References in periodicals archive
Currently, some market observers believe there is too much and not enough reward with high-yield corporate debt, but for investors desperate for yield, HYDW presents an opportunity for income in less volatile fashion than a standard junk bond ETF.
Drexel Burnham's free fall into Chapter 11 was a stunning setback for the company that pioneered the use of junk bond financing and bankrolled some of the biggest takeovers.
These rules apply to junk bond funds that are newly created after January 1, 2007, and invest only in domestic asset with 60 percent or more in bonds and 10 percent or more in the eligible debt securities.
on May 5 to junk bond status, citing their gloomy business prospects.
GM's descent into junk bond status, and vague but insistent premonitions of bankruptcy, illustrate that the company's "depression recovery" may be underway.
The action also resolves allegations that Credit Lyonnais intentionally misrepresented to the Federal Reserve the extent of its ownership interests in a portfolio of junk bonds that had been acquired from Executive Life, as well as its substantial equity investment and other relationships with Artemis, S.A., a French company that subsequently acquired the successor insurance company and junk bond portfolio.
Standard & Poor's sliced another notch off Electronic Data Systems' credit rating yesterday, placing the embattled services company just above junk bond level.
They are Mike Parton's reward for slashing debts at the troubled group which crashed from a stock market star to a junk bond in 2001.
Issuance in the second quarter of 2003 climbed to $70.1 billion, the most active period since the second quarter of 1998 when global junk bond issuance reached $53.8 billion.
Ninety percent of the $6 billion that flowed into longer-term taxable bond funds last month went into junk bond funds.
Depending on the methodology, estimated default rates vary from insignificant (e.g., a 1% to 3% annual default rate in Altman, 1987 and Altman and Nammacher, 1985), to substantial (e.g., a 30% chance that a junk bond will default before maturity in Altman, 1989 and Asquith, Mullins, and Wolff, 1989).
In early December international rating agency Moody's downgraded Tricom's different ratings to Caa junk bond status.
It is important to investigate these dates because regulators' handling of the crisis, not just the direct solvency implications of junk bond losses and policy surrenders, potentially changed the market perception of other insurance firms' values.
CanWest Global Communications' (Toronto, ON) desire to enter the trade publishing industry was denied after the company had to abort a $800 million junk bond issue.
After an attempted $800 million junk bond issue from CanWest failed to attract much attention the deal was scaled down from its planned initial $3.5 billion price tag by dropping about 70 trade magazines and a few newspapers and websites.