Commercial Bank has successfully re-accessed the CHF bond market with a CHF 150m benchmark transaction, bringing its total take out from the market to CHF 335m in less than six months.
The transaction marked the Bank’s fifth offering in the CHF market since its return in 2018 with the largest CHF bond issuance from the MENA region.
This brings total issuance volume to CHF 920m in the last three years. By targeting a 3-year tenor, Commercial Bank catered to pent-up investor demand for short-dated bonds with a positive yield.
The deal witnessed strong uptake from Swiss institutional investors, with 85 percent of the deal being allocated to fixed income asset managers and the remainder to pension funds, insurance companies and private banking/retail clients.
This latest deal is a great result for Commercial Bank, demonstrating its financial strength and the confidence the bank has earned from debt and equity investors.
This was further evidenced by the quick-to-market execution of the issuance without the need to conduct any investor roadshow to actively market the deal in advance of pricing.
Tapping international bond markets for funding continues to be an important part of Commercial Bank’s normal business operations, and by issuing in non-USD currencies such as CHF, the Bank is able to diversify its funding sources and lock-in attractive yields for long-term funding.
