Wall Street observers hoped recent gains signaled the arrival of blue skies, but the COVID-19 storm is thundering on. Stocks started shedding gains this week on fears of a possible second wave of coronavirus infections and a grim forecast for the economy from the Federal Reserve.A situation like this is tailor-made for defensive stock plays – and that will naturally bring investors to look at high-yield dividend stocks. But not all dividend stocks are created equal. Top analysts from Oppenheimer have chimed in – and they are recommending high-yield dividend stocks for investors looking to find protection for their portfolio. Using TipRanks database, we’ve pulled up the details on some of Oppenheimer's recommendations. These are stocks with a specific set of clear attributes, that frequently indicate a strong defensive profile: a high dividend yield, over 8%; a Moderate Buy consensus view; and a considerable upside potential — over 20%. So let’s take a closer look at three of Oppenheimer's picks.Monroe Capital (MRCC)We’ll start in the financial sector, with Monroe Capital. This private equity firm invests in the healthcare, media, retail, and tech sectors. These companies promote demographics that have less access to traditional capital resources; Monroe has stepped in to address the need.The company’s earnings took a hit in Q1, which was no surprise. The coronavirus economic hit was broad based and deep, so it was no surprise that MRCC reported 33 cents per share, or 5.7% below the forecasts. Revenue, at $16.2 million, was 2.5% below estimates, but up 8% year-over-year. Through all of that, Monroe has maintained its dividend payment. The company has an 8-year history of keeping the dividend reliable – an enviable record. Current earnings were not enough to keep the dividend at its 35-cent quarterly level; the next payment, due out on June 12, will be 25 cents per share. The downward adjustment is to keep the dividend in line with earnings. Even with the reduction, the dividend gives an annual yield of 12.2%, which is just plain stellar. Oppenheimer's Chris Kotowski sees plenty of reasons for optimism in MRCC’s long-term prospects. The 5-star analyst writes of the company, "We see relatively comfortable coverage in the next several quarters, a ~$10 NAV by year-end 2021 and see the stock as oversold relative to those expectations.""…management expects payment in 2Q20 on its $19M Rockdale Blackhawk position (currently in bankruptcy) following a favorable judgment. Proceeds will boost investment income once rotated into yielding assets or paying down debt. In addition, MRCC had ~$82M of liquidity at 3/31 across cash on balance sheet and its SBIC and the remaining draw on its credit facility, exceeding the unfunded commitment balance of $38.3M,” the analyst added.Kotowski gives MRCC a Buy rating, and his $10 price target suggests an upside of 31% for the coming year. (To watch Kotowski’s track record, click here.)Overall, MRCC shares have a Moderate Buy rating from the analyst consensus, based on 1 Buy and 2 Holds set in recent months. Rapid appreciation in the last couple of sessions has pushed the stock price near the $8 average price target. (See Monroe Capital stock analysis on TipRanks)Solar Senior Capital (SUNS)Next up is another finance company, Solar Senior Capital. SUNS is management investment company, in the externally managed non-diversified segment. Its primary investments are senior secured loans in mid-market companies with credit ratings below investment grade. Solar Senior invests first and second lien debt, as well as unitranche instruments.Solar avoided the big earnings hit that pummeled so many companies in Q1, and reported 35-cents EPS for the fifth quarter in a row. Along with the positive earnings, SUNS reported $234.1 million in net assets for the quarter, and $220 million in available capital.In area, SUNS did respond to the coronavirus epidemic. Starting in May, the company reduced its long-time stable dividend from 12 cents monthly to 10 cents. Management announced that the June payment will also be 10 cents per share. The reduced dividend payment annualizes to $1.20, and gives a yield of 9%. SUNS was reviews by Oppenheimer's Chris Kotowski, who saw reasons for buying in now. “The good news,” he wrote, “is that starting with an underlevered balance sheet and $21M of net repayments in the quarter and a well-priced debt issuance, SUNS has ample capital and liquidity to take advantage of the current market dislocation.”Kotowski rates SUNS a Buy and maintains a $15 price target, which implies a 21% upside potential. (To watch Kotowski’s track record, click here)SUNS has just two recent analyst reviews, but both are Buys, making the Moderate Buy analyst consensus rating unanimous. Shares are priced at $12.40, and the $16 average price target indicates room for 29% upside growth over the next 12 months. (See Solar Senior stock analysis on TipRanks)Outfront Media, Inc. (OUT)Last on our list is Outfront Media, a marketing company with a specialty in billboards and posters. The company uses electronic tech to update these traditional marketing staples, which remain an important part of urban marketing; billboard and posters, especially transit posters, have potential audiences in the millions. Outfront is, technically, a real estate investment trust – it owns advertising location properties, and leases them to the marketers.The economic slump in Q1 was hard on Outfront. The combination of social lockdowns and business and travel restrictions prevented normal operations, and outdoor advertising – which in these conditions did not pay for itself – took deep cuts. Even with that, OUT beat the Q1 earnings estimates. The company reported 28 cents per share, down 62% sequentially but beating the forecast by 33%. Looking ahead, however, analysts see SUNS entering a trough, with Q2 earnings estimated at a 21-cent net loss per share. On the dividend front, OUT paid out 38 cents per share in March, increasing the dividend from its long-term value of 36 cents. The new payment makes the yield 8.76%, a strong attraction for any income-minded investor.Covering this stock for Oppenheimer, analyst Ian Zaffino believes that Outfront holds a good position for long-term recovery, writing, “We continue to view June/July as the bottom and estimate a return to near preCOVID-19 levels sometime in 4Q20. Given OUT’s heavy exposure to the larger markets and national advertisers, it should enjoy a more aggressive recovery than its more local-focused peers.”Zaffino puts a $20 one-year price target on OUT, indicating a 32% upside to go along with his Buy rating. (To watch Zaffino’s track record, click here)What do other analysts say about the ad firm? It’s almost split. TipRanks analytics shows out of 5, 3 analysts are bullish on OUT stock, while 2 are sidelined. The consensus price target of $17.40 shows a potential upside of 14%. (Click here to see OUT's price targets and ratings)To find good ideas for dividend stocks trading at attractive valuations, visit TipRanks’ Best Stocks to Buy, a newly launched tool that unites all of TipRanks’ equity insights.

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Ackman, whose New York-based hedge fund has more than $10 billion in assets under management, is working with investment banks Jefferies, UBS Group AG and Citigroup Inc on the IPO, referred to on Wall Street as a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), the sources said. The sources requested anonymity because the IPO is still confidential.

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We often see insiders buying up shares in companies that perform well over the long term. Unfortunately, there are…

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On the heels of the blowout May jobs report, market participants got another update on how the U.S. Labor Market is faring amid the ongoing COVID-19 crisis with the weekly jobless claims report Thursday morning.

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Moderna Inc on Thursday confirmed it plans to start a trial of 30,000 volunteers of its much-anticipated coronavirus vaccine in July as the company enters the final stage of testing. The Cambridge, Massachusetts-based biotech said the primary goal of the study would be to prevent symptomatic COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus. The key secondary goal would be prevention of severe disease, as defined by keeping people out of the hospital.

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Menlo Therapeutics Inc.'s (NASDAQ:MNLO): Menlo Therapeutics Inc., a pharmaceutical company, focuses on developing and…

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(Bloomberg Opinion) — Copper has been on a steady upward trend, charging into a bull market and toward $6,000 per metric ton. That’s going to be tough to sustain. China’s stimulus efforts are being felt most strongly in infrastructure and construction. They have been less marked in other metal-intensive corners of the market: consumer goods and exports, which are still waiting for Europe and the U.S. to rally. Meanwhile, disruptions to supply from Latin America’s unfolding coronavirus disaster haven’t been enough yet to offset annualized demand loss. What happens next will be determined by whether Chile, Peru and producers like Indonesia, home to the world’s second-largest copper mine, can do better at controlling the epidemic than resource-rich Brazil.An economic bellwether, copper crumpled earlier this year as the scale of the pandemic became clear, falling by late March to its lowest levels since late 2016. The metal has clawed most of that back and with no large market surpluses in sight, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. is among brokers that have raised price forecasts. The comeback has been largely driven by China, which consumes half the world’s copper and has been steadily eating through stockpiles as industrial production restarts and building resumes. There’s plenty of encouraging evidence: Inventories, after soaring when the pandemic began, have tumbled back. Cancelled warrants, which represent metal earmarked for delivery and so suggest appetite for the physical commodity, have shot up since late May. Hiccups in mine activity are lending support. Shipments from Peru, which has seen perhaps the longest lockdown among top producers, are down by almost a fifth so far this year, according to UBS Group AG. Add in Covid- and price-related closures, project slowdowns and cuts to spending budgets, and the combination is telegraphing tight supply. Enthusiasm is visible among previously bearish money managers, who are turning bullish and adding to long positions.Is all of that enough to keep copper running high? Not necessarily. While consultancy Wood Mackenzie Ltd. estimates 2020 refined production will be down more than 1%, it expects refined consumption to contract by over 3%. The shape of China’s stimulus and recovery offers one reason for caution, as the effects of pent-up demand begin to fade. Take grid spending, usually a major driver of copper demand: After a contraction at the start of the year, investment has increased and the budget is expected to expand from a year earlier. Yet the emphasis is on ultra-high voltage electricity lines to cover long distances, which tend to use lighter aluminum. Production of consumer appliances like air conditioners is also still under pressure. Though better property and auto sales figures are encouraging, there was no significant real estate stimulus out of the recent National People’s Congress meeting. And measures to support the electric vehicle sector and its charging infrastructure may not be enough.More worrying is the weakness in the China’s exports, as seen in the May manufacturing purchasing managers’ index. About 30% of China’s apparent consumption of refined copper is actually exported, according to Cru Group, so extended lockdowns in India and elsewhere matter.It would be foolish to  underestimate China’s ability to throw money at the problem. Still, the bigger unknown for the coming weeks is how the coronavirus spreads in copper’s biggest producers. Peru has already seen exports drop but so far Chile, which accounts for about a third of global production, has continued to operate largely unscathed. That was easier when there were fewer cases in the wider population, but now the country is in the grip of a significant outbreak.Brazil, now with the second-highest case number in the world after the U.S., offers a cautionary tale. With case rates rising at and near mines, iron ore producer Vale SA has already been forced to suspend work at one complex, Itabira, and concerns are growing about the country’s north. Near its Carajas operations there, the local town of Parauapebas has 5,734 cases for a population of roughly 200,000.Indonesia is another worry, says Nick Pickens, copper research director at Wood Mackenzie, given the importance of the Freeport-McMoRan Inc.-operated Grasberg mine to additional supply into 2021. Reuters reported last month that the mine was now working with a skeletal team after a rise in coronavirus infections in the area, including in workers’ living quarters. That would add uncertainty further out, not least given the degree to which miners have cut capital expenditure, discretionary spending and care and maintenance, as Cru principal analyst Craig Lang points out. That leaves them less prepared if something goes wrong, and increases the risk of disruption. For now, though, it may take more to feed the bull run.This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.Clara Ferreira Marques is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering commodities and environmental, social and governance issues. Previously, she was an associate editor for Reuters Breakingviews, and editor and correspondent for Reuters in Singapore, India, the U.K., Italy and Russia.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinionSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

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(Bloomberg) — A massive wave of corporate distress is pitting beleaguered companies against their lenders in brawls that are shaping up to be nastier than ever before.Desperate firms and their private equity owners are seeking to take advantage of years of weakening creditor protections to help cut obligations and raise cash after the coronavirus outbreak brought businesses to a standstill. Be it via allowances written into borrowing documents when times were good or simply loopholes in deal terms, they’re siphoning collateral and transferring assets while pushing deeply discounted debt swaps onto investors, who risk seeing the value of their bonds and loans plunge if they don’t go along.Still, money managers aren’t just rolling over. Credit powerhouses like GSO Capital Partners, BlackRock Inc. and HPS Investment Partners have lined up scores of lawyers and financial advisers to defend their interests, often finding themselves at odds with one another as they fight for the biggest piece of a shrinking pie. As the gloves come off, industry veterans say tensions are as high as they’ve ever seen.“You have more and more aggressive people holding this stuff and private equity firms have gamed every nook of credit agreements,” said Dan Zwirn, chief executive officer of Arena Investors, which manages $1.4 billion. “As people get desperate, there are going to be a lot more of these.”The conflicts underscore how the legacy of the last crisis is being felt as the current one unfolds. The Federal Reserve’s relentless interest-rate cutting and quantitative easing spurred a surge in demand for higher-yielding assets, helping risky companies sell debt with fewer lender safeguards. Now, amid a fresh bout of economic pain, the effects of those policies are coming to bear.One such fight is currently playing out between Sinclair Broadcast Group Inc. and its creditors.The company through a subsidiary sold $1.8 billion of unsecured notes last year to fund the acquisition of Walt Disney Co.’s regional sports networks. Those securities have plunged as the pandemic left stations with no professional sporting events to televise.Relatively loose provisions in the bond documents have emboldened Sinclair to pursue a debt exchange which would see holders take a 40% haircut and swap into debt secured by the company’s assets.Lenders late last month balked at the terms, and a group led by Shenkman Capital Management organized to block the exchange. The response from Sinclair was ominous: the company said it was weighing other options including a possible maneuver that would shift company collateral out of creditor reach if the exchange offer was not successful.The potential moves were “threats” that appeared designed to pressure lenders, according to Covenant Review, which called the outstanding bond’s safeguards among the weakest it had ever seen.“Issuers are being more aggressive in the way they are going about debt exchanges; they’re looking for additional ways to coerce bondholders that haven’t been interested in participating,” said Scott Josefsberg, an analyst at the debt research firm. “But investors are putting up a fight so far.”Sinclair had imposed a June 9 deadline for the exchange.A representative for the broadcaster had no immediate comment, while Shenkman declined to comment beyond confirming its role leading the creditor group.Sinclair’s exchange offer was hardly the only one to provoke the ire of investors in recent weeks.SM Energy Co.’s efforts to get creditors to swap their bonds into new securities at 50% to 65% of face value have faced significant pushback. With only about 10% of note holders agreeing to tender last month, the oil and gas driller struck a separate agreement with a group of creditors led by BlackRock.The side deal was designed to backstop the exchange, and the BlackRock-led group got better terms for swapping its debt versus what was offered to other creditors. The move infuriated other lenders, who organized with law firm Weil Gotshal & Manges to oppose the deal.Bondholders that accept the exchange must agree to eliminate almost all restrictive covenants on the existing debt, which would hurt anyone who doesn’t participate. The deadline for the tender has been extended to June 12.SM Energy, BlackRock and Weil Gotshal & Manges didn’t respond to requests seeking comment.Revlon ClashAnalysts have been warning investors for years that weakening protections would ultimately have costs as investors ceded more and more ground to borrowers. Yet despite the recent surge in corporate stress, a Moody’s Investors Service gauge of bond covenant quality remained near the weakest on record in April. A similar tracker for loans reached its lowest ever in the fourth quarter, the most recent data available.Lender safeguards played a major role in Revlon Inc.’s contentious $1.8 billion debt overhaul last month.Creditors including Brigade Capital Management and HPS had organized to block the company’s refinancing plan because it allowed the firm to siphon off collateral and use it to back new debt. Supporters of the plan included Ares Management Corp. and Angelo Gordon & Co.The deal needed more than 50% of the holders signed on to close. At first, opposing lenders held a blocking position with a majority of the outstanding loan amount opting out. But Revlon secured a new $65 million revolving credit facility from the supportive lenders — which the company says was permitted under its covenants — ultimately giving it enough backing to push the deal through.Some lenders continue to contest the transaction, arguing that Revlon needed the majority of debt holders of every tranche to agree, and maintaining that the company breached covenants when it moved certain intellectual property to secure a $200 million loan last year, according to people with knowledge of the matter.Still any creditors that chose not to participate in the refinancing were demoted from having a first-priority claim on company assets to a third-lien claim.“Revlon is strengthening its balance sheet and increasing liquidity to better deal with the issues at hand, including Covid-19,” Chief Financial Officer Victoria Dolan said in a statement to Bloomberg. “This group of objecting lenders is trying to block that. We are confident that we will overcome this effort to hurt our company.”Representatives for Brigade, HPS, Ares and Angelo Gordon declined to comment.Transactions involving collateral transfers have been among the most fiercely contested between creditors and private equity firms scrambling to protect their investments.Paul Singer’s Elliott Management Corp. last month became locked in a fight with lenders of global bookings operator Travelport, which Elliott bought last year with Siris Capital Group. The owners shifted intellectual property estimated to be worth more than $1 billion to an unrestricted subsidiary — putting it out of reach of the creditors — to help it raise cash.Lenders led by GSO demanded that Travelport unwind the transaction for violating indenture agreements, and declared the step a default. The owners, who argue it was permitted, told them they would reverse the asset transfer if the creditors provided roughly $500 million of new financing and rolled up some existing debt holdings at a discount.The dispute has gotten so heated, Bank of America Corp. last month surrendered its role as administrator of Travelport’s loan to avoid taking a side in the feud, while Kirkland & Ellis recently resigned as the company’s legal representation, according to people familiar with the matter.With the sides at loggerheads, the private equity owners supplied the financing themselves in a loan backed by the disputed collateral, a move that’s likely to further inflame the situation.Representatives for Travelport, Elliott, Siris, GSO and Bank of America declined to comment, while Kirkland & Ellis didn’t have an immediate comment.‘Fight Like Dogs’Industry veterans say creditors should no longer be surprised when private equity sponsors use asset transfers, spinoffs, carve outs and other such moves following a number of high profile and hotly contested maneuvers in recent years.“Anyone professing to be shocked by it probably hasn’t been around very long,” said Philip Brendel a senior credit analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence.Yet with creditors so far showing little appetite to push for stronger covenants in borrowing documents, market watchers warn to expect more brawls in the months and years ahead.“Rates were suppressed long after they should have been; it drove yield hunger and a non-bank explosion that created misalignments,” Arena Investors’ Zwirn said. “Now they’re learning once again, there are consequences. We are at just the beginning of this thing. They’re going to fight like dogs to avoid those consequences.”For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

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