T&T Says No Plan for Sovereign Bond

Trinidad & Tobago has no plan to return to the markets with a sovereign issue, Vishnu Dhanpaul, deputy permanent secretary of the country’s ministry of finance, tells LatinFinance. However, the government expects to assist and act as a guarantor for government-owned entities. An issue from the rapid rail system of Trinidad will happen in 2009, Dhanpaul states, while deals for the water and sewerage authority, the Power Generation Authority of Trinidad & Tobago, as well as oil and gas companies NGC and Petrotrin are in the works, Dhanpaul says. He adds that no date yet has yet been set. The last time T&T issued a sovereign bond was in 2000, with a refinancing in 2006 for EUR150m. In a recent interview with LatinFinance, NGC president Frank Look Kin says his firm company does not have need for a government guarantee to access financial markets.