Olam International Limited (“Olam”), a leading agri-business operating across the value chain in 70 countries, today priced a benchmark 500 million issuance of perpetual capital securities (the “Capital Securities”) under its 5,000,000,000 Euro Medium Term Note Programme (the “EMTN Programme”).
The Capital Securities will constitute direct, unconditional, unsecured and subordinated obligations of Olam, and there is no maturity date for the Capital Securities.
The issuance was successfully priced following an intraday book-building exercise which attracted diverse participation with over 115 investors placing orders, resulting in an order book which was approximately 3.4 times oversubscribed.
In addition to demand from private banking accounts, the Capital Securities also saw strong participation from institutional investors such as fund managers and banks, which collectively were allocated 46% of the issuance.
In terms of geographical distribution, approximately 91% was allocated to Asian investors, with the remainder allocated to European investors.
The Capital Securities were priced at par and bear a distribution rate of 5.35% for the first five years, which was below the initial pricing guidance.
The distribution rate will then be reset at the end of five years from the issue date of the Capital Securities and each date falling every 5 years thereafter.
Additionally, Olam may choose to redeem in whole the Capital Securities on or after the fifth anniversary of the issuance of the Capital Securities.
This transaction is in line with Olam’s strategy of actively managing its capital structure in a cost-effective manner.
The joint lead managers and joint bookrunners for the Capital Securities were Credit Suisse (Singapore) Limited, DBS Bank Ltd. and Standard Chartered Bank.
N Muthukumar, Olam’s Group CFO said: “This deal is the largest ever US$ corporate perpetual offering by a Singapore-based issuer. We are extremely pleased by the broad-based participation by both institutional investors and private banks that resulted in a significantly oversubscribed order book.”
