The Globe and Mail reports in its Wednesday edition when Brookfield Asset Management announced a $250-million rate-reset preferred-share issue last week, the sell-off that ensued was extreme, even for the beaten-up preferred-share space. The Globe's John Heinzl quotes James Hymas, president of Hymas Investment Management, as saying, "It was total carnage." Mr. Heinzl says it is difficult to pin down what triggered the rout, which from Thursday through Monday wiped more than 5 per cent from the already battered S&P/TSX preferred-share index. Brookfield's new issue -- which is expected to begin trading on Oct. 2 under the symbol BAM.PR.H -- was probably a central factor, for a couple of reasons. First, it offers a juicy initial yield of 5 per cent, and Brookfield boosted the size of the offering from an initial $150-million, making everything else look worse by comparison. That means prices of existing preferreds had to fall to make their market yields more competitive. "A big fat yield like that could well have caused some repricing of the market as a whole," Mr. Hymas wrote on his PrefBlog. Second, BAM.PR.H will maintain a yield of at least 5 per cent when the dividend resets in 2020.