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Aldar Properties Raises $1.25b from Bond Sale

The five-year notes were priced at face value to yield 8.75 per cent, Bloomberg data show. The debt was issued through Atlantic Finance Ltd., a special purpose vehicle listed on the London Stock Exchange, Aldar said in a statement on Thursday.

“The appetite for Abu Dhabi names is still strong,” said Nish Popat, head of fixed income at ING Investment Management in Dubai. “It∆s a good size offering from a real-estate company in this environment.” Aldar had initially planned to raise as much as $700 million, he said.

The world’s worst financial crisis since the 1930s has weakened the property market in the Persian Gulf, sending home prices in Dubai down 41 per cent in the first quarter, Colliers International said. Aldar’s issue follows recent state bond sales in Abu Dhabi, the UAE emirate with the world’s largest sovereign wealth fund.Abu Dhabi’s government and the state-owned Mubadala Development Co. raised about $4.75 billion by selling 5- and 10- year bonds last month as credit markets opened up for borrowers from the city. The sovereign wealth fund, Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, had $328 billion in assets at the end of 2008, according to a study by economists at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.

Aldar, the biggest developer in Abu Dhabi, will step up coupon payments on the bond if rating firms downgrade the developer, ING’s Popat said. That feature gives ûunique comfort to investors, setting a new precedent for the regional borrowers,ì he said. Aldar’s debt is rated A3 by Moody’s Investors Service and A- by Standard & Poor’s. Mubadala sold $1.25 billion of 5-year bonds on April 29 that priced to yield 6 per cent, or 2.75 percentage points lower than the Aldar bond. Barclays Capital, Goldman Sachs International, National Bank of Abu Dhabi PJSC and Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank PJSC underwrote Aldar’s offering.