Record low interest rates are impacting corporate borrowers in a number of ways.

For one thing, they no longer are relying heavily on the commercial paper market, traditionally the main source for short-term funding.

Although dollar Libor rates have not hit the peak seen during the crisis in 2008, the three-month rate is now at the highest level since last August – at 0.421 percent on Monday - and the Libor Overnight Indexed Swap (OIS) spread, which gauges banks’ willingness to lend to other banks, is also at its widest since last August – at 19.2 basis points on Monday.

The rise shows that banks and institutional investors are becoming more risk-averse as fears rise over growing European deficits. Investors are wary of buying banks’ commercial paper, and both banks and institutional investors are looking for safe haven longer-term investments to wait on the outcome of ECB and EU stabilization measures.

Conduits and structured investment vehicles didn't completely disappear with the financial crisis, but banks that sponsor them are now being cautious with the types of assets they fund.

In particular, they are shying away from assets with long-term maturities such as mortgages and instead sponsoring new conduits with short-term assets that match the maturities of the commercial paper that funds them.

Corporate debt issuance may have picked up significantly this year, but that doesn't necessarily signal that companies are so comfortable in their economic outlook that they're levering up. 

In actuality, the amount of corporate debt outstanding globally shrank for the first time in at least 15 years in the first half of 2009, according to new research from Mizuho Securities, Bloomberg reported Wednesday.