Americas Leveraged Finance Weekly: Summer Pipeline Builds; Shutterfly Refinancing Tests Investor Appetite

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With summer approaching, the primary market heated up this week with a growing slate of acquisition and AI-infrastructure financings, while refinancings continued to test investor appetite.

Much of the primary market’s attention this week centered on Shutterfly’s oversubscribed refinancing package, which underwent multiple documentation revisions before final pricing of the notes.

The transaction was one of the more contentious deals in recent weeks due to concerns with the company’s financial performance and potential long-term risks with AI. Final terms incorporated investor pushback, including more restrictive covenants and one of the highest yields seen in the primary market this year.

Elsewhere in the market, AI-related issuance continued to account for a growing share of new supply. AI-linked capital expenditures has been well absorbed and, alongside increasing refinancings, has helped mitigate declining event-driven issuance this year in the loan market, according to a report by Bank of America.

This week, Octus reported that Crusoe’s data-center business has signed up a roughly $5.5 billion bank-led revolving credit facility and bridge financing that is expected to be taken out by bonds led by Morgan Stanley in the coming months.

Applied Digital tapped the high-yield market for $1.59 billion of senior notes at 7% to fund computing infrastructure for CoreWeave through a North Dakota data center. CoreWeave also returned to the market with a private offering of $3.5 billion-equivalent dual-tranche senior notes, including a $1.25 billion U.S. tranche, which priced at 9.625%.

Network Connex also priced an $800 million term loan B to fund Olympus Partners’ acquisition of the company, which provides digital infrastructure to hyperscalers and data centers.

Beyond AI infrastructure, acquisition financings continued to populate across sectors, signaling that the M&A pipeline is gradually rebuilding.

Belden tightened pricing on a $1.85 billion leveraged loan to SOFR+225 bps and 99.75 OID to fund the acquisition of RUCKUS Networks. Also in the market was a $765 million term loan B as part of a debt financing package to fund Apollo’s acquisition and combination of Emerald Holdings and Questex Holdings Group, coming at SOFR+375 bps-400 bps and 99 OID.

Elsewhere, the EQT-backed IVC Evidensia has reached out to investors for a potential refinancing after its amend-and-extend loan was pulled from the primary earlier this year due to market volatility, Octus reported.

Cable One is also in the early stages of premarketing a roughly $1 billion refinancing deal with prospective investors via JPMorgan to refinance Mega Broadband’s loan debt maturing in 2027 ahead of Cable One’s planned acquisition, Octus reported.

Looking ahead, Bain Capital is lining up a roughly $1.1 billion financing package to fund its $2.6 billion acquisition of Audax-backed FDH Aero, Octus reported this week. The RBC-led offering is expected to launch in July and includes an $875 million term loan B and $200 million delayed-draw term loan. EnergySolutions is also expected to launch a $1.1 billion leveraged loan via RBC Capital Markets to finance its acquisition by Energy Capital Partners in the coming weeks, Octus reported.

For more information on potential deal activity, see Octus’ Deal Origination Pipeline.
 

Issuance by Use of Proceeds, Ex-Repricings

Issuance by use of proceeds for both loans and bonds but excluding repricings is shown in the charts below. For year-over-year comparisons, Octus provides data for the last 14 months.
 

 

Pricing by Rating

Average spreads and coupons for loans and bonds, respectively, by ratings band are detailed in the charts below. Because of the limited activity of CCC rated issuance, only the months with issuance are shown.

Pricing by ratings category is shown below:
 

 

 

In the secondary market, debt prices of Insight Partners-backed Kaseya dropped after the IT management and cybersecurity software company disclosed a weak budget for the 2026 fiscal year, Octus reported this week.

The average price of Kaseya’s SOFR+350 bps first lien loan B due 2032 is 80.69 as of today, June 12, down from 87.84 at the beginning of the month, according to Solve. The average price of the company’s SOFR+525 bps second lien term loan due 2033 is 65.83, down from 76.93 in the same comparison.

Top daily loan decliners and risers can be found in Octus’ Credit Cloud. A search for the largest bond decliners is HERE.

Average high-yield bond spreads sit at 280 bps, wider than last week, according to ICE BofA data. The LSTA Leveraged Loan Index was indicated at 96.54, down slightly from last week.

Moody’s Ratings and S&P Global Ratings downgraded the following companies this week:
 

• Xerox Holdings Corp.
• Resource Label Group
• Pixelle Specialty Solutions LLC
• Likewize Corp.
• JetBlue
• Optimum Communications Inc.

Octus Covenants’ analyses of the documentation for new loan transactions can be found HERE.

Octus’ Private Company Analysis recent reports can be found HERE.

Octus’ Fundamentals Coverage Weekly Update highlights new-issuer coverage in Fundamentals for the syndicated credit universe, alongside transcripts for syndication calls.