Corporate bond market in healthy state for investors

Investors should be positive on the corporate bond market and not be concerned about expensive valuations, dividends and share buybacks, debt-funded M&A and leveraged buyouts (LBOs). Relative to the last few years, corporate bond spreads are tight, having recovered from the downturn in 2002, when WorldCom's collapse raised corporate accounting concerns. However, this timeframe is too short to draw any meaningful valuation conclusions. In recent years investors have seen the bursting of the TMT bubble and widespread fraud, but over the long term there have been protracted periods of low...