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Treasury & Capital Markets
RoP returns to Samurai bond market with multi-tranche offering
Chito Santiago 10 Aug 2018
The Republic of the Philippines (RoP) returned to the public Samurai bond market after an absence of eight years when it priced on August 8 a multi-tranche offering totaling 154.2 billion yen (US$1.39 billion).
The deal was priced at par and comprised of 107.2 billion yen for three years with a coupon of 0.38% and a re-offer spread of 25bp over yen swap offer, 6.2 billion yen for five years with a coupon of 0.54% and a re-offer spread of 35bp and 40.8 billion yen for 10 years with a coupon of 0.99% and a re-offer spread of 60bp.
The transaction also marked the first time in almost 20 years that the sovereign has issued Samurai bonds on a standalone basis and it was described as the biggest ever Samurai bond issuance from Asia, outside of Australia.
Before launching the deal, Philippine officials, headed by Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez, made a presentation on the domestic economy at the annual Philippine economic briefing in Tokyo in June, which was attended by around 500 investors. They highlighted, among others, the country’s ambitious infrastructure programme to sharpen its global competitiveness and attract more investments.
“The successful return to the Samurai bond market is the latest proof of the deepening investor confidence in the Philippine economy,” Dominguez says in a statement. “The strong response to this Samurai float, following a similarly successful offering of Panda bonds in China, underscores the international business community’s increasing interest in investing in the Philippine growth story.”
The RoP on March 20 this year priced the first sovereign Panda bond from the Asean region amounting to 1.46 billion renminbi (US$214 million) for three years, which further diversifies its investor base.
The Samurai offering was well-received by a good mix of institutional and regional investors – most of whom are new to the Philippine credit. These included asset managers, life insurance companies, trust banks and specialist banks, regional accounts, including Shinkin banks (Japanese deposit institutions), non-Japanese accounts and corporates.
“This year has been a trailblazing year for the ReP in the international capital markets,” adds national treasurer Rosalia de Leon. “We issued our debut Panda bond in March to tremendous investor endorsement. And with the Samurai offering, we continue to expand and diversify our market access.”
In terms of pricing, de Leon notes the sovereign has a track record of very tight pricing in the US dollar market and “we will be uncompromising in measuring against that benchmark in approaching new markets. Pricing on the [Samurai bond] offering is very compelling and we were able to print the maximum deal size we were seeking.”

Daiwa Securities, Mitsubishi UFJ Morgan Stanley Securities, Mizuho Securities, Nomura Securities and SMBC Nikko Securities acted as joint bookrunners and lead managers for the transactions. 

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