Leveraged loan issuers lean in to amend-and-extend deals to push back maturities
Leveraged loan issuers lean in to amend-and-extend deals to push back maturities.
Amend-and-extend volume totaled $27 billion in June, up from $26 billion in May, according to LCD. June's amend-and-extend activity came courtesy of 24 transactions, up from 21 in May. The $106 billion of A&E volume this year is running well ahead of last year's pace (roughly $84 billion over the first half of 2025). Last year was the second busiest year for such activity on record, behind only 2024.
Part of what continues to make amend-and-extend transactions attractive to issuers is the cost calculus versus a full refinancing. The average yield to maturity for refinancing institutional term loans via syndication is 6.7% in 2026, down from 7.4% in 2025 and 8.6% in 2024, but still higher than all the years spanning 2011-2022. With refinancing costs sitting above pre-2023 norms, extending an existing credit remains the cheaper path for many borrowers than marking the entire loan to market at today's spreads.
"Borrowers are also trying to be proactive and bring their deals to market before a new event that triggers risk-off sentiment, such as the AI-related selloff from a few months ago," said a market participant.
The distribution between institutional and pro rata A&E volume has been fairly balanced this year, with pro rata at $52 billion and institutional activity at $54 billion. June featured $18 billion of institutional volume and $8 billion of pro rata volume. Institutional volume in Q2 was $39 billion, the strongest quarterly showing in the recent series.
Note that pro rata debt typically entails amortizing TLAs and/or revolving credit facilities and is traditionally syndicated to finance companies and banks. Institutional debt consists of term loans structured specifically for institutional investors, including CLOs.
While there's still heightened urgency to address near-term maturities, LCD data show that the companies being given breathing room are, by and large, not immediate default candidates. In 2026, 30% of amendments were rated BB-minus or higher at the issuer level, up from 11% in 2025 and 26% in 2024. At the same time, the share of borrowers rated B-minus on one side has eased to 27% in 2026, from 44% in 2025 and 32% in 2024, while B/B+ credits account for 39% of activity, up from 33% in 2025 and 28% in 2024.
On the institutional side, sponsored borrowers have driven the majority of 2026 activity, accounting for $43 billion of the $55 billion in year-to-date institutional volume, while non-sponsored deals total $12 billion. The sponsored share is roughly in line with the full-year 2025 institutional mark of 79%, extending a multiyear run of sponsored dominance on the institutional side.
Broken down by sector, oil & gas tops A-to-E activity this year at 16%, followed by retail and services & leasing (each at 9%).
Six A-to-E transactions from the software sector closed in the first half of 2026, totaling roughly $9.1 billion. The two largest deals were Gen Digital's $4.24 billion extension in March , which pushed the company's 2027 maturity to 2031, and Athenahealth's $4.4 billion extension in May , which pushed 2029 maturities to 2032. Sponsored borrowers accounted for four of the six Software deals, and S&P ratings across the group ranged from B-minus to BB.
In 2025, sponsored and non-sponsored companies with pro rata loans were focused on extending 2027 and 2026 maturities — extending $38 billion of debt due in 2027 and $37 billion due in 2026, along with $14 billion due in 2028. So far this year, borrowers have extended $24 billion of pro rata facilities due 2027, $11 billion due in 2029 and $10 billion due in 2028.
On the institutional side, activity in 2025 was concentrated in 2028 maturities, with borrowers extending $54 billion coming due that year, along with $13 billion of institutional loans coming due in 2027. So far this year, borrowers have extended $27 billion of institutional facilities due 2028 and $14 billion due 2029.
Turning to the maturity wall, the amount outstanding in the leveraged loan market per the Morningstar LSTA US Leveraged Loan Index was $1.57 trillion at the end of June. Loan volume maturing through the end of 2027 narrowed to $32 billion by the end of June, from $62 billion at the end of 2025. The amount of loans coming due in 2029 and beyond, however, grew by $129 billion from the end of 2025 through the end of June.
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