Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], January 7 : India Exim Bank has raised USD 1 billion by issuing 10-year bonds in the international market, the bank announced on Tuesday. This makes it the first Indian organisation to issue dollar bonds in 2025.
The amount has been raised in 144A/Reg-S format. Under the Rule 144A, Qualified Institutional Buyers (QIBs) can trade debt securities without registration and review by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The Reg S bond type is available for offers and trades of securities outside of the U.S.A. to U.S. and non-U.S. QIBs.
On the back of a strong start to the year and a constructive market at Asia open, India Exim Bank capitalised on the strong demand momentum , with an intraday execution and tightening of 30 basis points (bps) from the Initial Price Guidance to achieve a pricing of UST10+100 bps, with a negative new issue concession of 5 bps.
This transaction also marks the tightest spread ever achieved for a 10-year public issuance out of India and the tightest 'BBB -' 10-year USD public issuance out of Asia ex-Japan, the bank stated in release.
In terms of geographic distribution, the bonds were well distributed, with 50 per cent in Asia, 32 per cent in EMEA region and 18 per cent in the USA. In terms of distribution to investor types, the bonds were distributed to high quality investors with around 64 per cent distributed to Asset and Fund managers, 18 per cent to Banks, and 16 per cent to Insurance, Pension Funds and Public Sector, followed by private banks and others.
Reacting to the development, Department of Financial Services in a post on X stated, "This demonstrates the strong confidence of overseas investors in the India story.This landmark transaction marks a strong start to the year for Indian issuers in the international debt markets, supporting Exim Bank's mandate and contributing to the vision of #ViksitBharat."
BofA Securities, Citigroup, HSBC, J.P. Morgan and Standard Chartered Bank acted as Joint Lead Managers and Joint Bookrunners for the offering.
India Exim Bank has been rated as Baa3 (Stable) by Moody's, BBB- (Positive) by S&P and BBB- (Stable) by Fitch.
Speaking on the occasion, Harsha Bangari, Managing Director of India Exim Bank, said, "We are delighted to open the debt markets for Indian issuers with the tightest spread ever achieved from India. Yet another issuance from India Exim Bank that sets the benchmark for a well-timed and quality issuance."
"India Exim Bank has been agile and continuously monitoring the market for attractive issuance windows. The quasi-sovereign nature of the Bank, strong credit profile and EMBIG index eligibility of the bonds garnered significant interest from marquee investors, with a peak order book of USD 2.7+ billion. Given the quality bookbuild and the large book size, we elected to move quickly to achieve a significant price tightening by 30 bps from the initial price guidance." added Deepali Agrawal, Deputy Managing Director, India Exim Bank.
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