Defaults among junk-rated emerging market companies are ticking higher, spelling danger for yield-seeking investors who may have been lured back to these assets by this year's price rallies in metals and oil.

Iron ore prices have jumped more than 50 percent this year, dragging up other base metals. Copper, for instance, is up almost 20 percent from its mid-January troughs. Oil has enjoyed a 65 percent peak-to-trough rally.

Those gains have given a new lease of life to commodity-linked assets, including the bonds of companies with sub-investment grade ratings, a large proportion of which are in the energy and mining sectors.

But many -- including Goldman Sachs on Friday -- see the commodities rally as unsustainable, and some bond investors are becoming more cautious.

"You are seeing more distress, and defaults are rising," said Bill Perry, a fund manager at U.S.-based Stone Harbor Investment Partners. "We are wary about certain corporate credits. You have to be a lot more selective."

Emerging junk bonds have outperformed this year, with yield spreads tightening 115 basis points (bps) in March alone -- double the contraction in U.S. high-yield spreads, Bank of America Merrill Lynch (BAML) noted.

Year-to-date returns are a respectable 6-7 percent, according to BAML indexes, after the sector made its first loss last year since 2008. Then, amid global turmoil, around 15 percent of junk-rated emerging companies defaulted, data from ICBC Standard Bank shows.

Defaults on emerging junk bonds are now running at 3 percent of the total outstanding debt, up from 2.4 percent a year ago, BAML calculates. It predicts a 4.8 percent default rate in 2016.

March saw 17 defaults across emerging markets, the bank noted, ranging from Mexican construction company ICA to China's Dongbei Steel.

Commodity names are emerging as the weakest links.

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