Rakuten Group hired banks for a $500 million bond sale at a time when high-yield dollar note funding costs are near 17-year lows.
The e-commerce firm is considering the sale of hybrid perpetual notes that can be called after five years, according to a person familiar with the matter. Rakuten is turning to the dollar bond market for the third time this year after pricing a combined $3.8 billion of such debt in the first half, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Rakuten’s planned dollar bond sale follows its bond offering in the currency in April, the data showed.
Rakuten, which is rated a sub-investment BB by S&P Global Ratings, is planning a note when high-yield debt funding costs are at near the lowest level since 2007, according to a Bloomberg U.S. high-yield corporate index. The Japanese issuer debuted its first offering in the dollar market in 2019 when it still had still had the lowest investment-grade score of BBB — from S&P.
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