Investors Ready With Chicago Questions

The Bond Buyer reports:

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and his finance team can expect some tough questions from the buyside Friday at the city's annual investor conference.

Emanuel launched the conference after he took first took office in 2011. This year it offers the buyside and other municipal market participants the chance to dig deeper into Emanuel's proposed 2016 budget and his revenue-side solution to the city's massively underfunded pensions: a record property tax hike.

At stake is the city's ability to convince investors who demand steep interest rate penalties to buy Chicago paper that it is turning the corner toward stabilizing its credit, which Moody's Investors Service dropped to junk in May.

The conference - closed to public and press -- offers investors direct access to both city and Chicago Public Schools leaders to answer their questions.

They have plenty.

"The governor has had a different approach on property taxes, so how is this going to work?" said Howard Cure, director of municipal research at Evercore Wealth Management LLC, referring to Gov. Bruce Rauner's push to freeze local property taxes.

Even Common Core math can't save Strongman Rahm Emanuel's budget fiction.