Sharjah hires banks for 30-year Formosa bonds to tap investors – Gulf Today

Sharjah hires banks for 30-year Formosa bonds to tap investors – Gulf Today

Sharjah hires banks for 30-year Formosa bonds to tap investors

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The 30 years' duration and the Formosa market would allow Sharjah to tap a new investor base.

Sharjah, the third-largest emirate of the United Arab Emirates, has hired banks to arrange the issuance of US dollar-denominated 30-year Formosa bonds, a document showed late on Monday.

Sharjah has hired Citi, Emirates NBD Capital, HSBC, Invest Bank, JPMorgan and Standard Chartered to arrange an investor call on Monday, to be followed by the issuance, subject to market conditions, the document from one of the banks arranging the deal showed.

It would be Sharjah's first Formosa, first long-dated and first conventional benchmark bond, said a source close to the deal. Benchmark generally means at least $500 million.

The government issued a conventional Panda bond - yuan-denominated debt issued by foreign borrowers - in 2018, but the size was about 2 billion yuan ($286 million), the source said.

The emirate's longest maturity in the public market so far is 10 years.

"The 30 years duration and the Formosa market would allow Sharjah to tap a new investor base,“ the source said.

Formosa bonds are sold in Taiwan by foreign borrowers and are denominated in currencies other than the Taiwanese dollar.

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