YEREVAN, December 3, / ARKA /. Corporate bond sales worldwide are poised to set an annual record as soon as this week as companies lock in borrowing costs that forecasters say are bound to rise, vestifinance.ru says citing Bloomberg.
Amazon.com Inc., Volkswagen AG and Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. have propelled offerings to $3.96 trillion this year, about $7 billion short of the peak of $3.97 trillion in 2012, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
In the U.S., home to the world’s biggest corporate bond market, borrowers have issued $1.5 trillion of debt, data compiled by Bloomberg show. Investment-grade companies have already sold a record $1.18 trillion of bonds.
Corporate bond issuance is also booming in Europe, with sales of 846 billion euros ($1 trillion) this year, up from 760 billion euros in all of 2013 and the most since 2010, Bloomberg data show.
Volkswagen, Europe’s biggest car manufacturer was among the largest corporate borrowers worldwide after raising more than $26 billion in currencies from dollars to yen.
Alibaba, the online marketplace operator founded by billionaire Jack Ma, raised $8 billion in October in Asia’s largest ever U.S. dollar-denominated bond offering.-0-
