Thornburg Mortgage Inc., the ``jumbo'' mortgage specialist trying to stave off bankruptcy, jumped as much as 53 percent after disclosing plans to sell $1.35 billion of debt paying 18 percent interest.
Investors buying the senior notes will receive warrants that may equal 48 percent of the company's common shares, Santa Fe, New Mexico-based Thornburg said in a statement today. Thornburg is asking for New York Stock Exchange approval to issue the new securities without a shareholder vote. Waiting for that approval ``would seriously jeopardize the financial viability of the company,'' Thornburg said....MORE
And:
High-yield, high-risk bonds are off to their worst start ever, and the biggest investors say there's no recovery in sight.
Junk bonds have fallen an average 3.9 percent this year, losing about $35 billion, according to data from Merrill Lynch & Co. indexes. Some funds managed by John Hancock Advisers LLC, OppenheimerFunds Inc. and Fidelity Investments are down more than 7 percent, showing that even the largest investors were caught off guard by the collapse....MORE
