Corporate bond sales worldwide are faltering after setting arecord in the first quarter as doubts about the strength of theeconomic recovery and Europe's sovereign-debt crisis resurface.

From the U.S. to Europe and Asia, issuance has fallen to thelowest levels of the year in the past two weeks, according to datacompiled by Bloomberg. Offerings this month of $87 billion fromborrowers led by Deere & Co., the largest maker of agriculturalequipment, and Montreal-based Royal Bank of Canada compare with aweekly average of $89.9 billion in the first three months of2012.

Sales are dwindling even as yields on bonds have fallen almost 1percentage point from last year's high of more than 5 percent inOctober, showing reduced confidence in the global outlook amongborrowers. Last week, International Monetary Fund Managing DirectorChristine Lagarde singled out a worsening of the European debtturmoil as the largest risk to growth, while adding that threats tothe economy have diminished.