Dubai: Gulf International Bank (GIB) has asked banks to submit proposals to arrange a potential US
dollar-denominated bond issue, banking sources familiar with the situation said on Monday.
The request for proposals was sent a few days ago and no mandate has been awarded yet, the bankers added. GIB, a Bahrain-based lender, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The new bond is likely to be issued early next year, the bankers and Dubai-based investors said. Unless documentation for a new deal is ready by now, there is little time to launch a new bond transaction in the Middle Eastern debt market before year-end, they noted.
GIB has a $500 million (Dh1.8 billion) Eurobond maturing in December 2017.
That paper, issued in December 2012 at 165 basis points over mid-swaps and yielding 2.4 per cent at issue date, was yielding 2.355 per cent on Monday, according to Thomson Reuters Data.
Barclays, GIB Capital, JP Morgan, National Bank of Abu Dhabi, Societe Generale and Standard Chartered were joint lead managers for the sale of those notes.
GIB, 97.22 per cent-owned by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, provides conventional and Islamic banking services, both retail and wholesale. It is rated Baa1 by Moody’s and A- by Fitch.
In addition to its outstanding US dollar-denominated debt, the bank issued earlier this year 2 billion riyals ($533 million) of five-year floating rate notes, which followed issuance of a 2 billion riyal floating rate bond sold in 2014 and maturing in 2019.
