Places for People, one of the UK's largest housing groups, today returned to the London Stock Exchange's Order Book for Retail Bonds, offering investors a ten year index-linked bond. The bond is tradable in denominations of £100 and will pay an RPI adjusted semi-annual coupon of one per cent per annum which will be adjusted to take account of the effects of inflation. Evolution Securities Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Investec Bank plc, acted as sole book-runner on the deal.
The placing, which raised £40 million, builds on the success of their initial retail bond last year and brings the total funds raised by the organisation on ORB to £180 million. The ability to offer retail sized bonds in a range of issue sizes is one the key benefits of ORB.
Pietro Poletto, Head of Fixed Income Markets at London Stock Exchange Group, said:
"We are delighted that Places for People have decided to return to the retail bond market within a year of their first issue. The successful placing of their second retail bond reflects positively on the development of the market and highlights the growing demand from investors. The placing also demonstrates the effectiveness of the market for companies seeking alternative sources of funding providing flexibility for both large and smaller issuers."
Chris Jones, Group Head of Tax and Treasury at Places for People said:
"We're delighted with the support retail investors have shown in this issue. Over the last 9 months we have raised £180m from the retail bond market, demonstrating strong demand for investment in the housing sector, which has good credit credentials, stable cash flows, and strong financial viability.
"The retail bond market represents a new stream of finance for the housing sector, and is part of our longer-term funding strategy to diversify our investor base through the debt capital markets and to increase flexibility and responsiveness to access the financial markets by unsecured fund raising across a range of maturities.
"The proceeds raised by the RPI linked bond will be used to finance Places for People's future operations, capital expenditure and to refinance existing secured bank debt."
