YEREVAN. – Araratbank CJSC, one of the leading banks in Armenia, successfully completed the first-ever placement of Armenian dram-denominated bonds of the Black Sea Trade and Development Bank.
Two bln bond issue has a 3-year maturity and semiannual coupon payments of 8,455%. But the bonds were sold at a small premium and gave an average yield of 8,3481%. This is several percentage points below the average yield of local currency bonds, but the issue was highly demanded, being oversubscribed by about 35%. Bids of purchase came from 16 companies.
Bonds were placed at Nasdaq OMX Armenia local stock exchange.
On issuer’s request, proceeds from bonds will be used to support mortagage lending in Armenia, Mr Ashot Osipyan, bank’s CEO, told the media at the press conference in Yerevan on Thursday.
“We consider this a highly important deal, because we offered our service to an A-rated international bank”, he said.
New bonds will soon become available for non-resident buyers too, through the nominee account of Clearstream (the depository of Deutsche Börse Group), which works at Nasdaq OMX Armenia.
BSTDB treasurer, Mr Christopher Best, called a local currency bond issue a win-win deal. “Bank’s general policy is not to have open positions in foreign currency whenever possible. We borrow in drams, we sell in drams. We are happy to support mortgage market in Armernia and provide more access to finance in local currency”, he said.
Araratbank OJSC is one of the largest banks in Armenia. At the end of 2016, bank’s assets reached 200,5 bln AMD (about $415 mln), increasing by 51,8% over 2015.
