After a slow start to the year, the samurai bond market is again in good health and attracting a number of new names. While pointing out that the yen is not its only forte, Daiwa Capital Markets underscored its samurai credentials with a recent inaugural transaction from the Slovakia. This, it says, had the lowest coupon ever seen for a debut sovereign issuer.
However, the ‘debut’ status is a technicality on one level, given that the National Bank of Slovakia issued in yen in 1994. That was back in the days when some central banks regularly issued as proxies for their sovereigns. The attractions of these yen-denominated instruments sold by foreign issuers to Japanese institutional investors have changed little since then. They provide investor diversification with no overlap at competitive rates.
