The state of affairs in leveraged loans

Recent jitters in the credit market have halted the momentum of the leveraged finance market, which had seen yields squeezed to eye-watering lows. Philip Moore reports

Overheated? Almost certainly. On the verge of a major meltdown that might send one or two overextended private equity sponsors or hedge funds to the wall? Equally almost certainly not. That seems to be the consensus verdict on the European leveraged finance market. "For the moment the market may be pausing for breath, with transactions being structured on a more conservative basis than they were in the first quarter of 2005," says David Yeoman, head of European leveraged loan markets