Private sector Axis Bank today joined its larger peers like SBI and ICICI Bank to sell overseas dollar bonds, mopping up USD 250 million at a coupon of 5.125 per cent that is steeply higher than the other banks.
The city-based third largest private bank said this new sale is only a “re-opening of its existing 5.125 per cent
senior unsecured notes due 2017”.
On August 17, the largest private sector lender ICICI Bank had raised USD 750 million from dollar bonds sale in a
5.5-year fixed rate notes carrying a coupon of 4.70 per cent, through its Dubai branch.
With an over-subscription of 7.6 times, the offering had an order book of USD 5.7 billion, with interest from over 312 investors.
Late last month, state-run SBI had mopped the largest and cheapest (by a domestic bank) foreign debt by raising USD 1.25 billion in dollar bond sale.
But the cheapest from a domestic institution came from Exim Bank earlier this month which raised USD 500 million for a cool 4 per cent coupon, which at 348 bps above US treasury, beat the SBI offer.
Commenting on the successful completion of the bond sale, Axis Bank President for Treasury, International Banking
and Business Banking P Mukherjee said, “in spite of the USD3.35 billion worth of bonds issued by domestic banks in the last four weeks, the overwhelming investor response to the re-opening of our existing notes highlight the consistent support to the bank’s credit from the global investor base.”
Barclays, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Citigroup, HSBC, JP Morgan, and Standard Chartered Bank acted as joint
book-runners and lead managers for the Axis Bank bond sale.
———————————-PTI