LawFuel – Singapore: Clifford Chance has advised Khazanah Nasional Berhad, the investment holding arm of the Government of Malaysia, on its third highly successful US$550 million issue of exchangeable Shariah-compliant bonds, also known as sukuks.
The sukuks will be listed on exchanges in Hong Kong, Labuan and Dubai and are exchangeable into shares of China’s largest department store operator, Parkson Retail Group Limited.
The latest issue was ten times oversubscribed and is the first of the client’s sukuks to be exchangeable into a stock listed outside Malaysia.
The sukuk was unique in that investors were also offered a stock-borrow option on the underlying shares of Parkson. Clifford Chance also advised the client simultaneously on the secondary placement of US$97 million of shares in Parkson Retail Group Limited. The sukuk issue and the placement were jointly arranged by CIMB, Deutsche Bank and UBS.
The firm advised the client on two earlier exchangeable sukuks, issued in 2006 and 2007.
“This latest issue was mandated and launched in less than a month,” said partner Crawford Brickley, who led the Clifford Chance team. “In addition, the sukuk was launched and priced on the same night, with the books open for only three hours after the close of the markets in Malaysia.”
The Clifford Chance team was led from Singapore by Crawford Brickley and associate Colin Dunlop, assisted by partner Debashis Dey and associates Ferzana Haq, Safira Nierojewski and Gillian Rooney in Dubai; and partner Connie Heng and associates Angela Chan and Debby Davidson in Hong Kong.
For further information, please contact:
Sally Greig, Regional Marketing and Communications Manager, Asia, on +852 2825 8850 or by email to sally.greig@cliffordchance.com
www.cliffordchance.com
