HOUSING DEVELOPMENT: FMBN SEEKS FUNDS FROM FOREIGN INVESTORS

The Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria is expecting off-shore facilities from four international investors for housing development, according to the Managing Director, Mr Abdulsalami Ahmed.

He made the announcement on Wednesday in Lagos in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria.

Ahmed said the bank would issue multiple international debt instruments, using a standard documentation framework for a transaction size of up to $1.5bn (N225bn) in tranches.

He named the four investors as Euromoney Medium-Term Note programme, SINOMACH (China National Machinery Industry Corporation), Korea Land and Housing Corporation and Foras International Limited.

He said, 'The strategy is to take advantage of international investors' preference for public sovereign investments and more liquid instruments, such as the Eurobond, under prevailing market conditions.

'The EMTN programme is a financing platform used regularly by international financial institutions to raise cheap funds with short and long-term maturities from the international debt market.'

Ahmed explained that the proceeds from the EMTN programme would be given on commercial terms for the construction of housing units by federal and state governments' housing agencies as well as private developers.