Hacker News Reader

Comment by whatok | Hacker News Reader

The Fed buying junk bonds is completely misleading and likely only has consequences for a single company; Ford. Ford has more liquidity on-hand than GM (investment grade which means nothing right now) and can likely ride this out better than they can. Which one is more "overextended"? Do you have any idea of how large the universe is that this covers? Are these non-high yield companies not "overextended" somehow because a random rating agency put some different letters next to their name?

View on HN

Ford's finances were marginal prior to COVID ramping up across the world (debt downgraded to junk in September 2019 [1]). If the Fed's actions are solely to support $F from becoming insolvent, that's in violation of their mandate.

Your argument holds little water when you wave away the ratings of "random rating agencies". Their ratings are what drives investment decisioning by the largest funds in the world.

[1] https://www.cnn.com/2019/09/10/business/ford-downgrade-junk/...

Ford was only downgraded by a single rating agency in September and only recently downgraded by the rest last month; well after the initial model of these facilities was announced. Ford has been preparing for being downgraded and has the liquidity to support themselves even without Fed action.

I'm not waving away rating agencies. I'm saying that General Motors has less liquidity than Ford. In your "no bailouts" world, Ford would be in better shape than General Motors. General Motors is investment grade, does that magically make them better than Ford even though cash on hand says different?

Ratings really mean nothing right now as far as the health of a company goes and ratings agencies have specifically mentioned that they are backlogged with assessing all consequences of what's going on right now. Ratings have and are always backwards looking data. How the "largest funds" in the world invest is completely irrelevant for this.

I'm not willing to argue further about a marginal automaker's balance sheet and debt ratings. You are free to your opinion. Their financial statements and debt ratings are publicly available for those interested.

You're making wildly sweeping statements about "extending and pretending" without having any of the underlying facts. I'm clarifying those statements with some underlying facts. Up to you to incorporate that into your worldview.

> agency put some different letters next to their name?

It might behoove you to learn what those letters mean before you partake in a corporate debt discussion.

I'm well-aware of what "those letters" mean. I hope you're able to contextualize that quote with the rest of that post as well as my subsequent reply.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com