The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s prominent lender Riyad Bank is planning an early redemption of $1.06 billion sukuk due in 2025, media reports said. It appears that the the bank’s sukuk redemption will be in full and at a face value at the end of June 24, 2020.
Riyad Bank has received regulatory approval for its sukuk redemption. It is reported that Riyadh bank will transfer the redemption amount in addition to any periodic distribution amount to sukukholders’ account on the stipulated date. This will be based on their sukukholdings as of 15 June, 2020.
In February, the bank sold $1.5 billion in 10-year dollar sukuk at at 180 basis points. With that, the bank received more than $7.8 billion in sukuk orders. JPMorgan, Riyad Capital and Standard Chartered were hired by Riyad Bank to lead the deal. Even First Abu Dhabi Bank and HSBC were part of the deal sale, media reports said.
Last December, Riyad Bank and National Commercial Bank had terminated merger talks. Both banks said in an exchange filing, “The boards of both banks have decided to end preliminary merger talks and not to continue with the merger study.” The proposed merger was expected to establish a bank with $183 billion in assets, media reports said.
Riyad Bank is one of the Kingdom’s largest financial institutions and ranks fourth by assets. Last month, the bank donated SAR 17 million to support health endowment fund dedicated to fight agains the Cover-19 pandemic. According to the bank’s statement, it is also the largest supporter of SMEs on the back of its vision to empower entrepreneurs and business owners.