BTG Pactual has reinforced its position as Brazil’s leading independent investment bank by issuing a $500 million international bond and by raising one of the biggest private equity funds in Latin America.
On June 30, the bank’s Cayman Islands branch priced the US dollar-denominated five-year bond, yielding 5%. It was heavily oversubscribed, with demand reaching $1.25 billion.
BTG Pactual had been working on the deal since last year but only offered it after the Cayman Islands office was authorized as a bank branch on June 13. It is part of a bigger programme involving total issuance of $3 billion during the next few years, although the bank says it will not issue more than $1 billion during any one year and it does not expect to return to the market this year. It does not plan to be a frequent issuer.
On June 28, the bank raised $1.6 billion for a private equity fund, called BTG Pactual Brazil Investment I. This is the third-largest sum raised in Latin America, after Southern Cross’s $1.7 billion fund last October and Advent’s $1.65 billion fund in April 2010.
More than half the fund’s capital comes from investors in the US, Europe, Asia and Latin America.