Short Demand For HY ETFs Hits Record

There’s been a lot of discussion about HY ETFs of late and it’s not hard to understand why.

As a reminder, junk bond funds saw massive outflows earlier this month in the wake of the market turmoil that also sent investors scurrying from IG funds (as rate jitters hit home) and, briefly, from equities.

You might recall the following from BofAML, out on February 15:

Citi had the following message for Bill Dudley following the “small potatoes” comment:

Citi strikes again: “New York Fed President Dudley may think the recent market losses are small potatoes but high yield listed fund outflows are more like a thick steak.” pic.twitter.com/tpRTbKBdib

— Walter White (@heisenbergrpt) February 19, 2018

Whatever the case, it seems clear that investors did precisely what you might expect them to do when they started to get nervous about junk: they went to where the liquidity was, dumping HY ETFs and getting bearish via CDS.

CDXHY