Dominican Republic: Dominican National Brewery expects US$370 mil in bonds

The Dominican National Brewery (CND), which controls 96% of the Dominican beer market, expects to obtain up to US$370 million in the next 7 years, in debenture bonds or debt issues, Dominican Today published March 12.

The information, published by the prestigious Latin Finance magazine and quoted by the local news site Clave Digital, is attributed to an unidentified financial executive.

The publication says that CDN wants to obtain at least US$270 million in promissory notes or bonds, and depending on market conditions will also seek to add RD$100 million to this amount. The CDN, which belongs to the E. León Jimenes group, expects to close its first offering at 8%.

The part of the issues in dollars has been qualified by Moody’s as B1.

The benefits would be used to cancel a US$270 million bridge loan that the group obtained to acquire the brewery’s part of the investment of Phillip Morris, which is also involved in the country’s tobacco industry.

Any remaining funds would be used to pay part of the US$157 million loan and another RD$43 million owed to Citibank and 10 other banks.

This operation will begin this week in London, to continue on the markets of Boston, Los Angeles, San Francisco and New York.