Dubai developer Binghatti lists inaugural $300 million sukuk on Nasdaq Dubai

Dubai-based private developer Binghatti on Thursday listed its inaugural $300 million (Dh1.1 billion) sukuk on the Nasdaq Dubai, becoming the first real estate benchmark dollar-denominated sukuk from Mena region in 2024.

The three-year Islamic bond was oversubscribed 2.1 times, reaching $621 million and priced competitively at 9.625 per cent.

Muhammad Binghatti, CEO of Binghatti, said demand for the sukuk was more than expected, exceeding 200 per cent of subscriptions.

“More interestingly, 20 per cent of the orders were international. Usually, bankers say it’s five per cent for a debut sukuk. This shows the trust that many of these institutional investors have in us and capital markets towards Dubai,” he said.

“As a developer, we like to have flexibility in terms of cash injections into the company. Today, we already have in the Escrow account more than 3 times the sukuk we issued. This is a form of financing where we will have the flexibility to utilise these funds as growth working capital and also working capital for existing projects that we have sold because the gestation period of these large uber-luxury projects is 2.5-3 years, and some of them are almost sold out. So, it makes sense only to build these quickly and hand them over. The more liquidity you have, the faster you build,” added Binghatti.