Municipal bonds issuance up from a year ago

Municipalities stepped up their issuance of bonds by 5.3% in January, from a year ago, according to The Bond Buyer. The issuances made up the majority of the municipal bonds entering the market last month — 380 — with a par value of $14.97 billion, according to the newspaper. A total of 511 new-money and refunding issues last month were shipped into the market, valued at $21.2 billion, according to The Bond Buyer, which cited data from Thomson Reuters in New York. Refunding bond issues are used to retire the outstanding debt of a prior bond issues. There were fewer bonds issued than during the comparable period in 2008, but they are worth more: 776 issues were distributed in January 2008, with a par value of $20.2 billion.