India Inc's biggest sale abroad, RIL to raise $4 bn in US dollar

Reliance Industries Ltd. (RIL) announced on Thursday that it had raised $4 billion in three tranches by issuing US dollar bonds, claiming it to be India's largest-ever foreign currency bond issuance.

According to a regulatory filing, the group raised $1.5 billion in a 10-year tranche, $1.75 billion in a 30-year tranche, and $750 million in a 40-year tranche.

On January 1, RIL's board of directors approved a plan to raise up to $5 billion in numerous tranches through US-denominated notes. The bond issue was oversubscribed three times, with orders primarily coming from Asia and the United States, according to the company.

The revenues from the bond sale will be used mostly to refinance current debt.

The mammoth issuance, according to Srikanth Venkatachari, RIL's Joint CFO, was not only the conglomerate's greatest debt capital market transaction, but also the largest debt capital market transaction ever, "the tightest credit spreads across each of the long-dated tenors for any corporate in India."

"The Notes are rated BBB+ by S&P and Baa2 by Moody's. The Notes were nearly 3 times oversubscribed with a peak order book aggregating ~US$11.5 billion and were priced through RIL's secondary curve. The Notes have been priced at 120 basis points, 160 basis points and 170 basis points over the respective US Treasuries benchmark," the RIL statement read.

 The conglomerate's massive fundraising comes as it prepares to make a major push into the new renewable energy business, which includes hydrogen and solar, over the next decade.

RIL Chairman Mukesh Ambani announced plans to invest Rs 75,000 crore in the new energy business at the company's annual shareholders meeting in 2021.