JGL d.d. has successfully completed its issuance of corporate bonds, with HRK 130m in bonds maturing in 2024. The new bonds come with a fixed annual interest rate of 1.75%, which is significantly lower than the interest rate for existing bonds that mature in 2020, which is 5.8125%. This is the lowest interest rate for corporate bonds outside the financial sector in the history of the Croatian capital market. Holders of the existing bonds were offered the option to replace them with the new issue. Most of them accepted and sold 63.32% of old bonds for a total of HRK 83.2 million.
"We are very pleased with the bond issue, the level of interest we have witnessed and the wide range of investors. The demand for our bonds at this yield level surpassed the supply, which we see as evidence of the trust the financial market has in our strategy. This issue comes at a time when our company is recording double-digit revenue growth and the best semi-annual results in history. In the first half of the year, the company’s growth rate was higher than the reference market in most of our key pharmaceutical markets and with key brands, and we expect to see similar results again at the end of 2019. Such good performance has enabled us to significantly reduce our debt, double our cash flow growth, and reduce our indebtedness factor to 3.0x EBITDA,” says JGL’s CEO Mislav Vučić, thanking the investors for their trust.
The order book was open for just under three days, during which time HRK 130m was offered and issued, which is quite an achievement on the domestic capital market. The bonds were listed on the Official market of the Zagrebačka burza d.d. stock exchange with the code JDGL-O-24XA and ISIN identification number HRJDGLO24XA2. The agent for this issue is Privredna banka Zagreb d.d.
The new JGL issue is the fourth corporate bond issue on the domestic market since 2007, which makes JGL one of the longest-standing issuers that continues to contribute to the development of the Croatian capital market.