BoC listed debenture raises Rs. 368 million

Ravi LADDUWAHETTY

The Bank of Ceylon which opened a Rs. 3 billion listed debenture issue last Thursday has raised Rs. 368 million as at 9 am yesterday.

Among the investors on the opening day were insurance companies, Pension Funds and Corporates which were available in their large numbers of subscriptions, Merchant Bank of Sri Lanka’s Deputy Director (Corporate Advisory and Capital Markets A.M.A. Cader told Daily News Business yesterday.

He explained that the applications were flowing from almost all 302 branches of the Bank islandwide and that counting was slow and that debentures took time unlike equity issues. The fact that we collected Rs. 368 million in three working days was good, given the depressed market conditions.

A breakdown and analysis of the figures will be when the issue closes on November 13.

Market analysts described the issue as being very positive for retail investors to get a positive return in the long term and the issue, due to the positive rating buttressed by the string rand presence, could attract the pension funds and the insurance companies which have large fund bases.