Having stuffed themselves with turkey at Thanksgiving, Wall Street’s bankers must be hoping to avoid vulture at Christmas. Distressed debt funds are circling the Street’s pile of unsold leveraged loans – about $168bn worth.

The prospect of getting these shifted at a decent price this side of new year looks pretty dismal. Alltel and Chrysler are just two issuers that have had to scale back or postpone the sale of leveraged loans.