The ABS market continued its rally last week as some secondary market spreads approached the tightest levels of the year. For the first week of June, the primary market issued $6 billion of bonds financing a diverse mix of corporate and consumer loans. The jobs picture remains bleak, but improving. Weekly initial jobless claims show that another 1.5 million Americans became unemployed in the week ending June 6. On net, nearly 20 million jobs have been lost since February, according to Fed Chair Powell. The Fed expects the unemployment rate to fall to 9.3% by year end, from today’s rate of 13.3% (or 16.1% if misclassified unemployed individuals are included in the calculation).
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