Irish Permanent has become the first Irish financial institution to raise funds in the new euro currency, with the issue of a 300 million euro (£240 million) denominated bond. The monies raised will be used to fund euro mortgages for its customers. The bond was issued by London-based Paribas bank, with Barclays, HSBC, Merrill Lynch, JP Morgan and NatWest also subscribing. Irish Permanent group finance director, Mr Peter Fitzpatrick, said yesterday that the bond issue had been fully subscribed, attracting 62 investors in total.
"There was a wide range of interest, with a number of names new to Irish Permanent coming on board." He said institutional investors from Switzerland, Spain, Germany, France and Britain had participated in the bond issue, adding that the bank could have raised substantially more than 300 euro given the high level of demand. The funds will be paid over to the Irish Permanent on May 28th next.
Funds were raised at 0.12 per cent above three-month money market rates in London and will become due in May 2003. The bond was issued under the bank's £1 million fundraising programme. Mr Fitzpatrick said it was now increasing this to £2.5 million to accommodate the demand for continuing residential mortgage growth throughout the Republic. He expects it may take some time before there is a demand for euro mortgages, but stressed that the company was pleased nonetheless that it was the first Irish company to get a euro bond issue away.
