Telco issuers have always been a big component of the European HY universe. 

It’s a long way from the early days of EHY when new entrants such as Colt, NTL, Telewest and UPC made up the bulk of the fledgling market, using DCF models to entice investors to fund the build-out of massive fibre networks. The days when HY could be used for venture funding. 

This didn’t end well, with mass defaults, and very low recoveries. I remember it clearly, tasked by Jefferies to find buyers of their busted converts after the turn of the century, not an easy task. 

Since then, save for a raft of restructurings for German Cable companies such as Callahan, eKable, and TeleColumbus (is it set to return?) as the unbundling from Deutsche Telekom unravelled, the Telco sector was much more solid, showing little signs of stress, let alone distress. 

But is that set to change after the abandonment of ZIRP?