The Asian Development Bank (ADB) returned to the US dollar bond market yesterday with the pricing of a $2.0 billion 5-year global benchmark bond issue, proceeds of which will be part of the bank’s ordinary capital resources and used in its non-concessional operations.

The bonds, with a coupon rate of 1.75% per annum payable semi-annually and a maturity date of 11 September 2018, were priced at 99.456% to yield 18.55 basis points over the 1.5% US Treasury notes due August 2018.

“The transaction garnered solid support from investors globally and resulted in an oversubscribed book, enabling ADB to print a $2 billion issue,” said ADB Treasurer Mikio Kashiwagi.

The transaction was lead-managed by Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs International, Morgan Stanley, and Nomura. A syndicate group was also formed consisting of Citi, Credit Suisse, Daiwa Capital Markets, HSBC, RBC Capital Markets, SMBC Nikko, and Standard Chartered.

The deal marks ADB's third global issue in the US dollar global bond market in 2013, having issued bonds with a 7-year maturity in January and a 3-year maturity in March this year.

As with previous ADB benchmark transactions, the issue achieved broad primary market distribution with 42% of the bonds placed in Asia, 38% in Europe, Middle East and Africa, and 20% in the Americas.  By investor type, 56% of the bonds went to central bank and official institutions, 23% to fund managers, 17% to banks and 4% to other investors.

ADB plans to raise around $11 to $12 billion in the capital markets in 2013.