FG moves to issue Eurobonds, to select advisers through open bid

The Federal Government has concluded plans to issue Eurobonds for 2021 and is going to pick advisers to the transaction through an open bid process.

The amount to be raised is expected to be within the external borrowing plans for 2021. The Federal Government in 2021 plans to raise $6.14 billion (N2.34 trillion) from foreign sources.

This disclosure was made by the Director-General of the Debt Management Office (DMO), Patience Oniha, during a chat with Reuters on Wednesday, April 7, 2021.

The Federal Government, who had earlier planned a Eurobond issue early last year after its sixth sale in 2018 where it raised $2.86 billion, deferred such plans due to the disruptions caused by the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic.

The DMO boss at an investors conference with the Federal Government put together by Citibank, last year, said that the Federal Government had no plans to source debt from Eurobond in 2020 as it is going to shift its focus to domestic borrowing and sourcing from concessionary sources.

Earlier this year, Nigeria reduced its external borrowings in a new debt strategy after it redeemed its 6.75% $500 million Eurobond in January with Oniha saying that the DMO was monitoring international markets for new issues by frontier countries.

What you should know

• Ghana had some time last week raised $3 billion from Eurobonds, a year after the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic, which disrupted economic activities globally.
• This will be a huge boost for Nigeria especially at a time the Federal Government is still struggling to get approval for the $1.5 billion loan from the World Bank due to issues on currency reforms.
• The Institute of International Finance had said it expected African governments to return to capital markets this year to sell bonds as investors embrace more risk.