DoubleDragon sets interest rate for long-term retail bonds

MANILA, Philippines — DoubleDragon Corp., the listed property developer owned by Edgar “Injap” Sia II and Tony Tan Caktiong, has set the interest rate for its upcoming P10 billion bond issuance aimed at beefing up the company’s cash reserves.

In a stock exchange filing, DoubleDragon said its board approved the retail bond issuance of up to P10 billion in the first quarter, consisting of P5 billion base offer and an oversubscription option of up to P5 billion .

The retail bonds, which come with a seven-year tenor, will have an interest rate of 7.77 percent per annum.

“The DoubleDragon New Year Triple-7 Retail Bond Offering carries the number seven in triplet, as in 777, which is believed by many to signify the multiplication of good luck,” the company said.

DoubleDragon said the upcoming issuance is set to be the only peso retail bond offering of the company for the year.

The retail bond offering will become the second tranche from the company’s bond program approved by the Securities and Exchange Commission via shelf registration last year.

“The pipeline capital-raising issuances at this stage of DoubleDragon’s growth is intended to further increase its cash position and further strengthen its balance sheet – all in line with the DoubleDragon’s goal to become a tier-1 mature company by this year 2025,” it said.

In November last year, DoubleDragon ended the offer period of its P10-billion retail bond offering two days ahead of schedule after surpassing the available allocation due to high volume of orders.

The bond offering was the first tranche of the company’s multi-year P30-billion shelf registration retail bonds program.

The final third tranche is planned for issuance by the company next year.

“This upcoming retail bond offering is intended to be offered in the first quarter of 2025 which could become one of the very first long-term peso retail bond offering available in the Philippines at the start of year 2025 at an expected attractive rate of 7.77 percent per annum and possibly the very last chance that the public can lock in their funds at 7.77 percent per annum rate for intended long-term seven-year tenor issued by a Triple A credit rated listed company with a diversified hard asset portfolio spread out in the Philippines and overseas,” DoubleDragon said.

The planned bond issuance has been assigned an issue credit rating of PRS Aaa, with a stable outlook by the Philippine Rating Services Corp. (PhilRatings).

Obligations rated PRS Aaa are of the highest quality with minimal credit risk, while a stable outlook indicates that the assigned rating is likely to be maintained or to remain unchanged in the next 12 months. 

PhilRatings said that the assigned rating and the corresponding outlook considered DoubleDragon’s clearly-defined and well-executed growth strategy as well as its experienced management and its ability to form solid alliances with industry-recognized partners.