The first comprehensive guide to the burgeoning, new high-yield debt or ''junk bond'' market. Edward Altman and Scott Nammacher, leading experts on debt financing and co-developers of the Zeta model for predicting business failure, offer sophisticated investors a complete analysis of the high-yield bond market, its anatomy, history, participants, risks and returns. With Altman and Nammacher's Zeta model, investors can gauge the safety of an issue before they commit. This book helps private investors and mutual fund, pension, bank, and insurance money managers make sure their junk bonds don't live up to the name.