Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the Oxford Square Capital Corp Third Quarter 2023 Earnings Conference Call. My name is Jaquita. I will be the moderator for today's call. All lines will be muted on a presentation portion of the call, with an opportunity for questions and answers at the end. If you would like to ask a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad. I would now like to pass the conference over to your host, Jonathan Cohen. Jonathan, please go ahead. CEO, please go ahead.
Good morning, everyone. Welcome to the Oxford Square Capital Corp Third Quarter 2023 earnings conference call. I'm joined today by Saul Rosenthal, our President, Bruce Rubin, our Chief Financial Officer, and Kevin Yonon, our Managing Director and Portfolio Manager. Bruce, could you open the call with a disclosure regarding forward-looking statements?
Sure, Jonathan. Today's conference call has been recorded. An audio replay of the conference call will be available for 30 days. Replay information is included in our press release, as issued earlier this morning. Please note that this call is the property of Oxford Square Capital Corp. Any unauthorized rebroadcast of this call in any form is strictly prohibited. At this point, please direct your attention to the customary disclosure in this morning's press release regarding forward-looking information. Today's conference call includes forward-looking statements and projections that reflect the company's current views with respect to, among other things, future events and financial performance. We ask you to refer to our most recent filings with the SEC for important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated in these projections. We do not undertake to update our forward-looking statements unless we're required to do so by law.
To obtain copies of our latest SEC filings, please visit our website at www.oxfordsquarecapital.com. With that, I'll turn the presentation back to Jonathan.
Thank you, Bruce. For the quarter ended September, Oxford Square's net investment income was approximately $6.4 million, or $0.11 per share, compared to $6.7 million, or $0.13 per share, for the prior quarter. Our net asset value per share stood at $2.78, compared to a net asset value per share of $2.88 for the prior quarter. During the quarter, we distributed $0.225 per share, which included $0.12 per share of special distributions. For the third quarter, we recorded total investment income of approximately $13 million, as compared to approximately $13.5 million in the prior quarter.
In the third quarter, we recorded net unrealized appreciation on investments of approximately $13.9 million, or $0.28 per share, compared to net unrealized appreciation on investments of approximately $8.3 million, or $0.16 per share for the prior quarter. In the third quarter, we recorded realized losses of approximately $13.6 million, or $0.24 per share. We recorded realized losses on investments of approximately $3.3 million, or $0.07 per share in the prior quarter. During the third quarter, our investment activity consisted of sales of approximately $1.9 million and repayments of approximately $14.2 million. No purchases were effected during the quarter. As of September 30th, we held cash and cash equivalents of approximately $12.4 million.
Subsequent to quarter end, on November 3rd, we redeemed $7 million of the $14.4 million in aggregate principal amount of issued and outstanding 2024, 6.5% notes. The notes were redeemed at 100% of their principal amount of $25 per note, plus accrued and unpaid interest. During the quarter ended September, we issued a total of approximately 1.4 million shares of our common stock, pursuant to an at-the-market offering, resulting in net proceeds of approximately $4.4 million and net accretion to shareholders of approximately $0.01 per share of NAV for the quarter. On November second, our board of directors declared monthly distributions of $0.035 per share for each of the months ending January, February, and March of 2024.
Additional information regarding record and payment date can be found in our press release that was issued this morning. With that, I'll turn the call over to our portfolio manager, Kevin Yonon.
Thank you, Jonathan. During the quarter ended September 30th, 2023, U.S. loan market performance improved versus the prior quarter. U.S. loan prices, as defined by the Morningstar LSTA US Leveraged Loan Index, increased from 94.24% of par as of June 30 to 95.55% of par as of September 29th. According to LCD, during the quarter, there was some pricing dispersion, with double-B-rated loan prices increasing 56 basis points or 0.57%, B-rated loan prices increasing 142 basis points or 1.49%, and triple-C-rated loan prices increasing 145 basis points or 1.84% on average.
The 12-month trailing default rate for the Morningstar LSTA U.S. Leveraged Loan Index decreased to 1.27% by principal amount at the end of the quarter from 1.71% at the end of June 2023. Additionally, the distress ratio, defined as the percentage of loans with a price below 80% of par, ended the quarter at 4.36%, compared to approximately 6% at the end of June 2023. During the quarter into September 30th, 2023, U.S. leveraged loan primary market issuance was $70.7 billion, representing a 237% increase versus the quarter into September 30th, 2022. This was driven by refinancing and M&A activity, while LBO activity remained relatively slow.
At the same time, U.S. loan fund inflows, as measured by Lipper, were approximately $500 million for the quarter ended September 30th, 2023, while outflows were approximately $13.8 billion on a year-to-date basis. We continue to focus on portfolio management strategies designed to maximize our long-term total return. As a permanent capital vehicle, we historically have been able to take a longer term view towards our investment strategy. With that, I will turn the call back over to Jonathan.
Thanks, Kevin. Additional information about Oxford Square's third quarter performance has been posted to our website at www.oxfordsquarecapital.com. And with that, operator, we're happy to open the call up for any questions.
Absolutely. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad. If for any reason you would like to remove that question, please press star followed by two. Again, to ask a question, press star one. As a reminder, if you're using a speakerphone, please remember to pick up your handset before asking your question. We will pause here briefly as questions are registered. There are no questions waiting at this time, so I would now like to pass the conference back over to the management team for closing remarks.
Thanks very much. We'd like to thank everyone for their participation on this call or listening to the replay. We look forward to speaking to you soon. Thanks very much.
That concludes today's conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect your lines.