New Year Kicks Off with Busy Month of Leveraged Loan Launches

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At $168.0b in launches through January 28th, the US institutional leveraged loan market has been off to a hot start in 2026, good for the seventh busiest month of launches on record. Following $57.5b launches during the week ending January 16th, issuers continued to pile into the market. In fact, the $36.8b launched on January 26th was the busiest day of primary market activity since July.

January tends to be a busy month for the loan market, with five out of the ten busiest months of launches on record taking place during the first month of the year.

While repricings accounted for approximately 70% of the monthly issuance total, M&A activity totaled $22.9b or 14% of monthly volume, buoyed by large financings such as Hologic’s $8.75b financing backing its takeover and BioMarin Pharmaceutical’s recent launch of a $2b TLB to fund the acquisition of Amicus Therapeutics.