Bond sales by companies worldwide slowed to an 11-year low in January as investors shunned risk amid a meltdown in capital and commodities markets, Bloomberg News reported today. About $329 billion of debt has been issued so far this month, the least for a January since 2005, when $299 billion of securities were sold, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Since the Fed raised rates last month, a rout in Chinese equities has fueled concern that a slowdown there would spread to the global economy. The Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index has since plunged 6.8 percent, oil prices have declined 20 percent over the same period and junk bonds have lost about 1.8 percent. January is on track for the slowest month for initial public offerings on U.S. exchanges since December 2008, when no companies filed to raise shares after the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.
