ICICI Bank to issue $300 mn senior unsecured notes

ICICI Bank has proposed to issue five-year fixed rate senior unsecured notes, worth $300 million, maturing in 2010. Global credit rating major Standard and Poor's today assigned its BB+ rating to the issue.

The proposed notes will rank senior to all subordinated debt issued by the bank in the future. Proceeds of this proposed issue are expected be used to meet the general funding requirements for the bank's international operations, subject to regulatory approvals.

This issue constitutes the direct, unconditional and unsecured obligations of ICICI Bank and will rank pari passu with all of the bank's prior obligations.

This includes the bank's existing $300 million senior, unsecured notes due in 2008 and 2009 (both assigned a BB+ rating) and the $150 million senior unsecured notes due in 2007 (rated as BB+).

The in-principle approval has been obtained for listing the notes on the Singapore Exchange.

The rating assigned on the bank's proposed senior unsecured debt is the similar to S&P's long-term counterparty credit rating on ICICI Bank. It is also in accordance with its global criteria.