“One could characterize many of them as companies that have long needed to address their capital structures,” Damian Schaible, co-head of restructuring at law firm Davis Polk, said referring to the firms that filed in the last couple of days. “And there’s a bunch more on the horizon.”

Eoin Treacy's view

The longer interest rates stay high, the greater the pressure on borrowers. That is true of both the corporate and sovereign sector. Low interest rates and abundant credit allowed a large number of highly leveraged companies to survive much longer than would have been expected under normal credit conditions. The primary question is in how well they extended maturities during the pandemic.

The High Yield Bond ETF continues to encounter resistance in the region of the 200-day MA and will need to sustain a move above it to question scope for additional downside.