BoC receives Rs. 4.27 b for bond issue

Hiran H.Senewiratne

Bank of Ceylon received Rs 4.27 billion worth of applications oversubscribing the initial tranch of Rs. 3 billion in the debut Rupee capital market issue of the bank, Assistant Manager Corporate Advisory and Capital Markets Merchant Bank Plc Hijan Suhair said.

He said the BOC believes this as a milestone in the path of success in the industry of banking and finance towards building stable balance sheets and capital adequacy of the Institute.

"Wide spectrum of applications, which has been received from the Pension Fund, insurance Companies, Provident Fund and high networth individuals for this issue," he said.

By improving the capital,it allows BOC to attract more revenue based projects and transactions to be seized as and when it appears from the market place while adhering to the compliancies", Suhair said. BOC received 1002 applications with large investments from pension funds, provident funds and high networth individuals.

BOC offered a lifetime opportunity on a state Bank investment via a Debenture issue, which had three returns, options to the investors.

Although the investment was Unsecured and subordinated to Debt, it is tradable at the Colombo Stock Exchange with the use of the DEX system. Most of the application was offered at floating rate option basically interest paid Rs 3.69 billion in the flat rate options for six months Treasury Bill rate plus 75 basic points payable bi-annually until maturity of five year period he said. Fixed rate of 19%p.a. payable annually until maturity. (Maturity - 5 years)