The Hindu Business Line : WBIDFC issue raises Rs 1,000 cr in two days

An infrastructure finance arm of the West Bengal Government has set what is being seen as a new record of sorts in large scale mobilisations from institutional investors: Rs 900-crore plus within the first few hours, ending up in Rs 1,000 crore in two days flat.

The West Bengal Infrastructure Development Finance Corporation (WBIDFC), which has in the past done quite a few large issues, is said to have beaten examples set earlier by itself and others of its ilk, at least considering the more recent ones.

Investment banking circles associated with the exercise point towards a serious mop-up effort on their part, which helped in the early closure of the offer. "This is arguably the largest of its kind. To the best of our knowledge, nothing like this has happened in the past six months," said a source whose company played a key role in the mobilisation.

The WBIDFC issue, which came with three options, may retain Rs 130 crore under Option I and Option II, while under the third option it may retain Rs 870 crore, it is learnt.

The offer, which carried an A (SO) rating and was guaranteed by the State Government, was priced at 8.75 per cent, 9 per cent and 9.1 per cent for five, seven and 10 years, respectively. A number of leading investment banking firms, including I-Sec and Centrum, were mandated by WBIDFC.

As investment bankers state, the primary issuance market is now seeing (or has recently seen) the arrival of IDBI, with an AA+ rated issue, priced at 8.95 per cent, for 10 years. Also, Indian Oil did a sale of oil bond, and State Bank of India did an Upper Tier II bond issue for Rs 2,000 crore.

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