The deal also marked the latest bond deal sold online, part of a growing trend in the bond market. Ford Motor Credit, the financing-arm of auto maker Ford Motor Co., first planned on selling $2 billion of bonds, but boosted the figure to $4.5 billion amid strong investor demand. The deal was the fourth-biggest of the year.

"The 10-year notes were significantly oversubscribed, and that's why we increased the offering," said Jim Merli, head of fixed-income syndication at Lehman Brothers Inc., one of three firms that joint-managed the deal.

The corporate-bond market, at least for investment-grade issues as opposed to junk bonds, has been picking up since the Federal Reserve raised interest rates on May 16. A shot in the arm came last week when several economic reports suggested the economy is heading for a soft landing and additional interest-rate increases might not be needed. "The catalyst, which changed the sentiment and tone in the corporate market, was Friday's employment report," said Mr. Merli. Since then companies have been rushing to raise money.

"People have been stampeding the markets and the relief has been audible," said Jennifer Doerr, capital-markets analyst with Standard & Poor's MMS. She added, "The markets are ready to absorb a lot more of this new issuance."

This week has already seen some $12 billion in new bond deals, including a $3 billion deal from International Paper Co. late Wednesday.

"This is the most constructive tone we've had in a long time in the credit markets," said John Romanelli, managing director at Credit Suisse First Boston, a unit of Credit Suisse Group.

In fact, some smaller deals, which have had a tougher time, have been able to price. South Carolina Electric & Gas Co. raised $150 million, and Homeside Lending Inc. raised $300 million.

This is the fourth installment in Ford's Global Landmark Securities Program (GlobLS), modeled after Fannie Mae's frequent-issue program and the Treasury's own issuance schedule. Chase Securities Inc. and Goldman, Sachs & Co. co-managed the deal with Lehman.

Ford raised $2 billion in three-year notes at a rate of 7.67%, or 1.117 percentage points over Treasurys. An additional $2.5 billion in 10-year notes was raised at a yield of 7.921%, or 1.795 percentage points over Treasurys.

The new-issue premium, or difference between the interest rate on new issues and previously priced bonds, has been shrinking. According to Ms. Doerr at S&P, in April new issueswould have had to price 0.15 to 0.20 percentages over Treasurys and yesterday Ford priced its 10-year note just 0.05 percentage point over the existing 10-year. In another indication that the bond market is struggling to find a new benchmark, as Treasury issuance declines, the Ford bonds were priced in relation to rates on interest-rate swaps, rather than Treasurys, which has traditionally been more common.

Some argue swaps are better benchmarks because they don't have some of the issues affecting Treasury prices, such as buybacks. The Ford deal became the third issue this year to use the swap curve as a yardstick during the marketing phase of the deal. Still, like other large bond deals recently, the notes were also priced to reflect a yield margin over Treasury securities, bankers said, suggesting that the bond market has not yet moved away from pricing bond deals in relation to Treasury prices.