Banco de Bogota Brings Debut

By sticking to a shorter tenor and enticing investors with an attractive pickup to rival Bancolombia, Banco de Bogota was able to draw a decent crowd for its debut bond in a market that is not necessarily enamored with the FIG paper. After turning heads with 5.5% area talk on a $500m 5-year, Banco de Bogota was able to revise guidance lower to 5.25% (+/- 1/8) and upsize to $600m before pricing at 98.894 with a 5.00% coupon to yield 5.25%. Books swelled to around $3.25bn as investors comped the credit (Baa2/BBB minus) against Bancolombia’s 2016s (Baa3/BBB minus), which were trading between 4.25%-4.375%, a spread differential that leads were heard justifying by the maturity extension and the bank’s debut status. The bonds were trading up 0.45-0.75 points in the grey, according to an investor. The transaction raises funds to take out half of a $1.2bn 1-year bridge loan used to expand into Central America through the $1.9bn acquisition of Panama-based BAC-Credomatic in July 2010. Banco de Bogota is also raising a $500m 3-year syndicated loan, which is documentation nd expected to close later this week. Citi, HSBC and JPMorgan managed the sale, and were also leads on the bridge and loan as well.