The World Bank announced today that in the middle of the week of January 6 it plans to launch a new U.S. dollar global bond issue. The size of the issue will be $1.5 billion. The Bank's global bonds have had maturities of five to ten years. This issue's maturity is expected to be toward the longer end of that range.
The bonds will be noncallable to final maturity and underwritten and distributed simultaneously in the Euromarkets and in the U.S. domestic market and the Far East. As with the prior issues, these securities are designed to trade globally, on a 24-hour basis, through integrated clearing systems in the U.S. and the Euromarkets.
In preparation for the global bond issue the World Bank announced the formation of the management group of investment dealers that will bring the issue to market. Deutsche Bank Capital Markets Limited and Merrill Lynch Capital Markets will serve as joint book running lead managers. The other members of the management team are Credit Suisse First Boston Limited, Daiwa Securities, Goldman, Sachs & Co., IBJ International Limited, J.P. Morgan Securities Inc., Lehman Brothers, Salomon Brothers Inc., S. G. Warburg Securities, UBS Phillips & Drew Securities Limited, and Yamaichi Securities.
