Commercial Bank Of Qatar Tightens Guidance For Five-Year Bond

Commercial Bank of Qatar tightened the pricing guidance for its benchmark-sized, five-year, U.S. dollar bond to a range of 120 to 125 basis points over mid-swaps, a document from lead arrangers showed.

The lender, rated A1/A-/A by international rating agencies, had set initial price thoughts in the area of 135 bps over mid-swaps earlier in the day. It expects to close the books on Tuesday.

Commercial Bank of Qatar has gathered more than $2.25 billion in orders for its bond sale so far, the document showed.

The bank has around $1 billion of bonds maturing in November this year, and bankers expect the firm to refinance at least a part of those bonds.

“It would not be a surprise that the bank raises $1 billion to keep its current liquidity untouched given the favourable market conditions to issue bonds,” a banker said on condition of anonymity as he is not allowed to speak to the media.

Bank of America-Merrill Lynch, HSBC and Morgan Stanley are arrangers of the bond sale, for which investor meetings concluded on Monday.

Traditionally, benchmark size is understood to mean at least $500 million.

The bank follows a string of United Arab Emirates borrowers accessing the international debt market as favourable market conditions have pushed borrowing costs to record lows.

Issuance is however expected to taper off ahead of the holy Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, which starts at the end of June.