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S&P dishes out investment grades to Genesis Energy bonds; Guardian Trust expects two more repayments to investors in mortgage fund; Bond prices on the rise as government note maturity floods market, ASB; Deposit war goes long as ANZ boosts three, four- and five-year terms.

Sunday, August 23rd 2009, 9:21PM

S&P dishes out investment grades to Genesis Energy bonds
Rating agency Standard & Poor's has given two new Genesis Energy investment grade ratings.

Genesis' fiscal performance is expected to be satisfactory by the ratings agency, and the government's postponement of its carbon trading scheme will give the company more time to adjust to the new requirements. Still, it notes Genesis is the most exposed of New Zealand's power companies to any potential carbon scheme.

The $25 million fixed-term and $25 million floating term medium notes will be senior unsecured debt of Genesis, and will be due in February 2017.

Guardian Trust expects two more repayments to investors in mortgage fund
Guardian Trust expects to make another two repayments to investors in Guardian Mortgage Fund on top of the 25% it has already paid since the fund's wind-up earlier this year.

Investors can expect a repayment of 10% in September and at least 5% in December, the trust told investors.

Guardian Trust has increased its provisioning for the fund, but said it was too early to say whether this will translate into a similar level of losses.

Bond prices on the rise as government note maturity floods market, ASB
Bond prices have been on the rise after the 2009 government bonds matured, flooding the market and pushing yields lower, according to ASB's latest fixed-interest report.

The bank expects this liquidity problem to last until the end of the month, and said now is a good time for investors to sell if they are considering liquidating their portfolio in the short-term.

Deposit war goes long as ANZ boosts three-, four- and five-year terms
The war for deposit rates has extended into long-term money, with ANZ boosting rates on one- through five-year rates for deposits under $10,000.

The bank upped its terms 100 basis points, 50 points, 150 points, 200 points, 250 points, and 300 points on 12-month, 18-month, two-, three-, four- and five-year rates respectively, and lifted deposits over $10,000 by 50, 75 and 50 points for the three-, four- and five-year terms.

KiwiBank raised its stakes in the three- through five-year space by 25 points, 50 points and 50 points respectively, while BNZ lifted the same terms by 50, 75 and 50 basis points.

Westpac, which signalled long-term rates may rise last week, boosted its three- through five-year rates 50, 100 and 50 basis points, and slashed its five-month terms 110 points. The bank also cut its six-month terms 30 basis points for deposits under $10,000, and boosted them 80 pips for deposits over $10,000.

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