Ge Capital Bond Raises Rs 75 Crore On Day One

GE Capital Services India Ltd raised Rs 75 crore on the opening day of its bond issue, an official at ABN Amro Bank NV said.

ABN Amro Bank and lead managers DSP Merrill Lynch helped structure the product which is India's first non-convertible debenture to be linked to an indicative overnight money market rate, said Vishnu Deuskar, the bank's country treasurer.

The issue was for a total of Rs 50 crore with an option to retain an additional Rs 25 crore, he said.

It was privately placed with banks, financial institutions, insurance companies and corporates, he said.

The bonds had a face value of Rs 50 lakh each.

The bonds' maturity was 36 months with a put and call option at the end of 12 and 24 months.

The issue has been rated AAA (SO) by the Credit Rating Information Services of India Ltd (Crisil) and AAA by Duff & Phelps indicating highest safety, Deuskar said.

GE Caps is a wholly owned subsidiary of the international General Electric group.

Interest will be at the rate of 400 basis points above the Reuters' Mumbai Interbank Offer Rate (Mibor), Deuskar said.

Money market dealers said this would work out to a rate less than 11.5 to 12.0 percent, which were the going rates for bonds of similar tenure issued by private sector firms.

Mibor is the weighted average of the closing overnight interest rates offered by 17 banks, financial institutions, and primary dealers in government securities.

"The interest rate will be compounded on a daily basis," said Deuskar.

Call money rates are currently around the Reserve Bank's repo rate of six per cent. Tuesday's Mibor was 5.98 per cent.