Maynilad sees raising more than P12B from ‘blue bonds’

Maynilad Water Services Inc.’s pioneering blue bond sale appears to have piqued the interest of investors as the offer West Zone concessionaire’s “blue bond” sale is reportedly oversubscribed.

Maynilad is offering P12 billion worth of blue bonds and intends to sell P3 billion more in case of an oversubscription. Proceeds have been earmarked for sustainable water and wastewater management projects.

“From our last report from our banks, it’s oversubscribed and they’re confident of beating the P15 billion. That’s the latest that we’ve got from our banks,” Maynilad president and CEO Ramoncito Fernandez said on Tuesday.

BPI Capital Corp. was tapped as the sole issue manager for the maiden blue bond sale. BPI Capital, BDO Capital & Investment Corp., First Metro Investment Corp. and East West Banking Corp. were engaged as joint lead underwriters and joint bookrunners.

When asked where the investing public’s interest in their latest offering came from, Fernandez told reporters that their blue bonds are “a unique investment offering” that did not come from the usual companies that sell securities.

“It’s a unique investment. It’s in a utility and it’s in water [business] so that’s the uniqueness,” he added.

Blue bonds refer to a subset of green bonds and sukuk—or a bond-like instrument that complies to Islamic religious laws—whose proceeds will exclusively be used to finance or refinance new and/or existing eligible blue projects and activities.

When this was announced last May, Maynilad said the offer period was to be May 27 to May 31 and that the bonds were intended to be listed on the Philippine Dealing and Exchange Corp. on June 7. But Fernandez said Maynilad sought an extension to list the securities by the first week of July.