Kenya’s ARM Cement seeks up to $105 mln in bond to retire other debt – paper

Kenya’s ARM Cement aims to raise up to $105 million via a privately placed five-year bond to retire more expensive short-term debt, Kenya’s Business Daily newspaper reported.

The bond offer by east Africa’s second biggest cement producer opened on Thursday and would run until Dec. 2, the newspaper reported.

“The proceeds from the five-year bond will be used to replace existing short term borrowings. There is no increase in total debt only refinancing existing short-term debt,” Pradeep Paunrana, chief executive of ARM Cement, told the paper.

ARM planned to raise $90 million from the debt securities, with an option to take in an extra $15 million should the original amount be oversubscribed, the newspaper reported.

The chief executive told Reuters he would provide information on the bond issue on Tuesday but was not immediately in a position to do so.

ARM Cement posted a pretax loss of 645 million shillings ($6.32 million) for the nine months to September, blaming losses related to the depreciation in regional currencies against the dollar.