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Wall Street dealers were already bracing for a potential record in September for high-grade United States corporate bond sales, and recent surging yields may give the blue-chip companies even more reason to borrow now before funding costs rise further.

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Average yields for U.S. high-grade notes are above 5.5 per cent, hitting levels not seen in more than two years. Higher yields and future heavy tech-sector issuance may spur companies to lock in current borrowing costs now, according to Tom Murphy, head of investment-grade credit at Columbia Threadneedle Investments.

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“Boy, if I was a CFO or treasurer and had something to do in 2027, I’d probably pull it forward into 2026,” Murphy said.

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The risk of waiting is that government bond yields will keep rising, and corporate debt will weaken relative to U.S. Treasuries, pushing borrowing costs for companies even higher. Spreads for corporate bonds are still at relatively low levels, hovering below 0.8 percentage point for much of this week on average, according to a Bloomberg index.

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“Despite higher interest rates, it’s almost like a ‘the devil you know’ type of situation where you’d rather issue now with credit spreads still relatively tight than wait, risking that more supply later in the year could impact valuations,” said Moshe Tomkiewicz, head of investment-grade debt capital markets at Mizuho Americas.

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Dealers forecasted about US$215 billion of U.S. high-grade bond sales for September, according to an informal poll by Bloomberg News. The month’s record was set last year at US$207.5 billion. There are some Wall Street predictions, though, for issuance to potentially reach US$250 billion.

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Investment-grade supply has set records in half of 2026’s eight months, including the past three, and volume is tracking 7.6 per cent above 2020 levels. Then, pandemic-fuelled issuance reached about US$1.75 billion for the year, an annual record.

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Global sales of publicly syndicated bonds have been at a record pace throughout. Helping fuel U.S. primary markets has been technology companies raising funds for investments in artificial intelligence. Such volume is liable to just keep rising given the tens of trillions of dollars in AI-related spending that is projected.

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Meanwhile, what’s often a seasonally quiet period for debt markets has been uncharacteristically active the past few weeks as global bond yields reached levels not seen since 2008.

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This is the third consecutive week that sales in Europe have topped the equivalent of about US$46 billion, after mid-August kicked off with the busiest-ever restart following the summer lull there. Meanwhile, U.S. high-grade sales at US$8.3 billion through Wednesday are the highest for the week before the Labour Day holiday since at least 2019.