Debt

Insurers have become the biggest U.S. investors in the market, topping banks and hedge funds to amass a third of all domestic holdings.

Private equity-owned companies are again raising debt to pay their owners dividends, just as warnings sound about saddling businesses with more leverage in the midst of a downturn.

Lenders estimate that over the next five years, some 10 percent of new U.S. leveraged corporate loans could end up happening in the private market, a major shift from a year or two ago when large private deals were rare.

The Federal Reserve chairman pledged to use every tool at the central bank's disposal to limit the economic fallout from the coronavirus and urged lawmakers to take further action.