ICO has launched the first social bond issue on the Swedish krona market

01 January 2018

  • With this new issue, ICO has consolidated its commitment to the social bonds market
  • The transaction was completed for the sum of 500 million Swedish krona

19/09/17.- Instituto de Crédito Oficial (Baa2/BBB+/BBB+/AL) has launched a bond issue for 500 million Swedish krona (equivalent to approximately 52 million euros).  It is the first social bond issue carried out in this currency.

ICO has consolidated its commitment to the social bonds market and underlined its strategy of extending this type of issue to different markets. By doing so, the Institute is able to diversify its investor base by including a new currency in its social bonds.  Until now, the three transactions completed in this category had been issued in euros.

The transaction, with a five-year maturity, was led by Danske Bank and pays a coupon of 0.963% in Swedish krona. The issue was placed mainly among Scandinavian accounts. The participation of so-called "SRI accounts" was noteworthy; these accounts involve socially responsible policies in terms of investment decisions.

Following today's transaction, ICO has a total of four social bond issues on the market, with an approximate total value of 2,052 million euros. Instituto de Crédito Oficial is committed to using the funds raised by this type of transaction to finance the projects of companies located in autonomous regions of Spain with a GDP per capita below the national average. 

To comply with its transparency commitment to investors, ICO distributes the impact report for transactions of this kind one year after their launch. The funds obtained through the first two issues were used to finance projects involving more than 35,100 SMEs. This activity made it possible to create or maintain more than 225,400 jobs.