Wellcome Trust returns to bond market

Finance | Gareth Jones | 26 May 2009

The Wellcome Trust has priced £275m of guaranteed bonds due in 2021 at a rate of interest of 4.75 per cent, the lowest coupon on a UK corporate bond issue of more than 10 years in duration since before the credit crunch in 2006.

Barclays Capital, JP Morgan, Cazenove and Morgan Stanley have acted as joint bookrunners and lead managers on the issue, for which the initial order book was more than three-and-a-half times oversubscribed.

This is the second time the biomedical research charity has issued bonds, having become the first charity to receive an Aaa/AAA bond credit rating from Moody's and Standard & Poor's respectively in 2006.

Danny Truell, chief investment officer at the Trust, said: “It has been our widely publicised strategy to review regularly market conditions and correspondingly, on occasion, to access the bond markets when circumstances are appropriate.

“We remain as committed as ever to our Aaa/AAA ratings from the agencies, and it is testament to the strength of our financial position that we have seen such strong demand for this bond."

Directory: Wellcome Trust
Who's Who: Gareth Jones

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