The IFC has just issued (books closed a couple of hours ago) a USD1 billion, 3 year, AAA "Green Bond" tied to climate investments - yes, that's a climate bond in our parlance. Interest rate set at 3 year US Treasuries +15 basis points. If you want to see just how low interest rates are for US Treasury bonds see this Wall Street Journal story. Low low low.
Managers are Citibank, MorganStanley & JP Morgan. Orderbook is apparently oversubscribed; we hope to later find out how much, but an excellent result.
The IFC is a member of the World Bank Group and is the largest global development institution focused on the private sector.
Within the broad climate bonds universe, those labelled "Green Bonds" have mostly come from the World Bank/IFC. Proceeds are ring-fenced to climate investments, as per Climate Awareness Bonds from the European Investment Bank, and so on. You can find details in the IFC Green Bond newsletter.
This is the biggest "Green Bond" to date by far, and a big-step up for the IFC; combined IFC issuance before this deal had totalled $1.2bn. Go IFC!
