Important drivers of nominal payday spreads

Spread volatility is one of the most important underlying drivers of nominal spreads. Investing in more volatile sectors requires a higher compensation (higher option adjusted spread) because it is more difficult to target projected returns. There is a close relationship between aggregate spread levels and aggregate spread volatility. Periods of tight spreads are accompanied by [...]

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It can be stated that senior banks were less volatile than the telecommunications and automobile sectors. Especially the automobile sector and subordinated insurance increase the risk profile of a portfolio due to higher volatility and offer more potential to outperform/underperform the corporate benchmark if an overweighting is targeted. Services noncyclical and technology appear unattractive as they offer a relative low spread and a high spread volatility. The media, telecom and services cyclical sectors have an attractive risk-return profile and consequently should be overweight in a portfolio. The different spread volatilities of the sectors lead to divergent investor behavior regarding risk aversion /appetite, which in return results in different risk premia (spreads).

The rating differences between the various sectors have to be considered as well because in this example we compare AA-rated financials with low A/high BBB-rated telecommunication and automobile companies.