Ottoman-Era Bank Taps Foreign Cash After 23 Years: Turkey Credit
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TC Ziraat Bankasi AS, the bank founded in 1863 during the Ottoman Empire, plans to sell Eurobonds for the first time in 23 years to finance lending at cheaper rates than the cost of deposits.
Turkey’s biggest state-run lender will sell as much as $3 billion in foreign currency-denominated bonds over the next year, the first time since 1989 it will tap international investors, the company said Nov. 8. Ziraat only has lira-denominated debt. The yield on its notes due in February 2013 fell to 6.5 percent today from 7.75 percent on Sept. 7, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.