Saint-Gobain announces dual-tranche bond issue for total of €1.75B

Lorena Madrigal

PARIS , September 22, 2011 (press release) – EUR 1000 million, 4 year maturity, annual coupon of 3.50%
EUR 750 million, 8 year maturity, annual coupon of 4.50%

Compagnie de Saint-Gobain today set the terms of a dual-tranche bond issue for a total amount of EUR 1.75 billion with an average maturity of around 6 years and an average annual coupon of around 4%.

The strong demand generated by this operation (with an orderbook for the two tranches of over EUR 7 billion from close to 400 investors) enabled Saint-Gobain to complete the issue within a short time with a higher size and an improved pricing compared to the initial targets.

This bond issue, which will mainly serve to refinance existing debt, enables Saint-Gobain to both lengthen the average maturity of its debt and optimize its average cost of funding.

The transaction underlines bond investors' confidence in the credit quality of Saint-Gobain, whose last offering on the euro bond market took place in September 2010.

Saint-Gobain's long-term senior debt is rated BBB by Standard & Poor's and Baa2 by Moody's.

Crédit Agricole Corporate & Investment Banking, J.P.Morgan, The Royal Bank of Scotland and Société Générale Corporate & Investment Banking acted as lead managers for this bond issue.

Located in 64 countries with nearly 190,000 employees, Saint-Gobain, the world leader in the habitat and construction markets, designs, manufactures and distributes building materials, providing innovative solutions to meet growing demand for energy efficiency and for environmental protection.

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