By Peter OBIORA InvestAdvocate
Lagos (INVESTADVOCATE) – Transcorp Hotels Plc (TRANSCOHOT), the hospitality unit of Nigeria’s top conglomerate, Transnational Corporation of Nigeria Plc (TRANSCORP) on Monday listed its N10 billion (Series 1) bond on the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) at N1, 000 per note.
Valentine Ozigbo, chief executive officer (CEO) of Transcorp Hotels at the listing ceremony said it was an interesting experience coming to the Stock Exchange for the second; this time to list a N10 billion (Series 1) bond.
“It’s an interesting experience, this is the second time we are coming to floor of this Exchange and this time is for bond and we are extremely glad that we were successful in raising the Series 1 N10 billion seven-year bond,” he said.
According to him, the fund raised will help in upgrading the iconic Transcorp Hilton in Abuja and to bring it to a world class status.
“This will help us in upgrading the iconic Transcorp Hilton in Abuja to bring it to a world class status. It was nominated and voted as the best leading Hotel in Africa and obviously, what we are trying to do is to bring in another mark in this hotel and make it a world class hotel,” Ozigbo added.
The CEO of TRANSCOHOT affirmed that having successful raised the fund, the firm is certain that their objective will be met. “We are also certain that our capital mix and structure will be much optimized, before now we had operated purely on zero non-interest bearing debts, so this is the first debt we are introducing into our books and we are glad that indeed we are beginning to optimize our capital structure. We are also glad that we are offering this opportunity to the investing public to be able to create wealth and glad that indeed our request today has been granted,” he said.
Transcorp Hotels early November 2015 announced a successful N10 billion, series 1, in a seniour 7-year 16 percent fixed rate (unsecured) bonds Due 2022. The Series 1 Bonds were fully underwritten by FSDH Merchant Bank Limited and United Capital Plc.
The new bond carries a gross coupon of 16 percent per annum (amortised) for a period of seven years. The redemption on maturity, expected to be 2022, will be at 100 percent of the nominal amount of the fixed income instrument.
However, shares of parent company of TRANSCOHOT, TRANSCORP at the close of Monday’s trading on the local bourse inched 2.04 percent to N1.00 per share from 0.98 kobo per share recorded the last session.
