City of Chicago, Chicago River Skyline
The City of Chicago is issuing $700 Million in General Obligation Bonds
This Week’s Featured Municipal Bond is a $700 Million General Obligation Issue by the City of Chicago. The City will fund a variety of capital projects and pay down its outstanding commercial paper.
Chicago is scheduled to sell General Obligation Bond Series 2019 A in the amount of $700,000,000 on March 27, 2019 by negotiated sale. The issue is being brought to market by a group led by Barclay’s.
The Series 2019 A bonds are direct obligations of the City and all taxable property in the City is subject to ad valorem property taxes to debt service on the 2019 A Bonds without limitation as to rate or amount. The City has pledged its full faith and credit to pay principal and interest on the 2019 Series A Bonds.
About the City
The City’s 2017 population was 2,716,450, ranking it as the third largest city in the United States. The number of persons estimated to be living in the city was down by 42,000, which is less than a 1% decrease from the previous year. On many counts, Chicago is considered a global commercial city due in part to the number of Fortune 500 companies that maintain their global headquarters here.
As of January 31, 20189 the City’s unemployment rate stood at 4.6%, which is 1.3% lower than the same time last year, and most recently .5% higher than the national rate. According the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Chicago CBSA metropolitan area has an unemployment rate of 4.8%, which is 0.5% lower than the same time last year.
According to the bond prospectus, the bonds are rated BBB+ by S&P Global Ratings Group , BBB- by Fitch and A by Kroll. All three rating agencies have assigned a stable outlook to the bonds.
These details and more on purposes, security, risks and other matters pertaining to these City of Chicago general obligation bonds can the found in the official statement, provided by MuniOS. After registering, visitors can link directly to the official statement as well as an investor’s roadshow by searching for the City of Chicago.
Statistical Snapshot of City of Chicago Selected Financial and Economic Indicators
City of Chicago financial snapshot as of December 31, 2018 Fiscal Year Audit. Source: Merritt Research Services, LLC
Provided at left is a quick snapshot of financial characteristics of the City of Chicago along with the medians for other cites of all sizes, courtesy of Merritt Research Services, LLC. Merritt has many of the sector medians publicly available and regularly updated on their Benchmark Central page. (Merritt believes the data to be reliable but does not make any representations as to its accuracy or completeness).
In addition to the Merritt information related to the featured bond, more information can be found on our municipal bond calendar, city, state, and county pages.
These facts and numbers are for informational purposes, and should not be considered an official disclosure for potential investors. Investors should consult the official statement. None of the information provided should be construed as a recommendation by MuniNet Guide, MuniNet LLC, Merritt Research Services LLC, or any of their employees. Information and analysis is for informational purposes only.
Potential investors should rely only on the official documents and figures provided in the official statement (prospectus). Although the numbers presented in this summary are primarily derived from public documents, including issuer audits, issuer reports and other public sources such as federal reporting agencies , they are not intended to replace official information presented in connection with the bond sale. Medians may differ from official sales documents due to methodology or survey base variances.