Kenya Eurobond 2018

Kenya’s National Treasury has just announced a new $2 billion Eurobond which was seven times oversubscribed amid concerns about the country’s debt levels and intrigues about the availability of an IMF financing line.

The official Kenya Government statement reads: The fact that we got $14billion in investor appetite reflected the continued support the country receives. We now have a dollar yield curve stretching out to 30 years, making Kenya one of only a handful of government’s in Africa to achieve this. 

The funds are earmarked for development initiatives, liquidity management, and ambitious infrastructure programs. It goes further to add that the Eurobond issue will be listed on the London Stock Exchange and that the joint Mandated arrangers were Citi, J.P. Morgan, Standard Bank, and Standard Chartered Bank.

There was little awareness about the bond, no prospectus was publicly released, and there was no indication on which investors the Eurobond was being pitched to, but it appears that the successful issue will be dated February 28, 2018. 

The Eurobond breakdown is for a mix of two equal halves of 10-year and 30-year bonds, priced at 7.25% and 8.25% respectively.

The announcement comes after some potentially embarrassing news reports that the International Monetary Fund had cut off a line of funding, a statement which was later retracted, and others that Moody’s had downgraded Kenya’s ratings, a claim which the government also disputed.

But the ratings cut, and the mysterious IMF news (and retraction) did not appear to have an impact on the pitch to investors.

This is the second Eurobond after another set of bond issues in 2014.
$1 = Kshs 101.4

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  1. Pingback: Kenya Eurobond 2018 A to Z (Part II)

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