15 February 2024

BBVA strengthens its leadership in the Turkish bond market

The bank reinforces its position as one of Turkey's leading investment banks, after participating in three major public bond placement transactions in recent weeks.


BBVA is a best-in-class financial institution in the Turkish market that offers end-to-end financial solutions to its clients, thanks to its local presence through Garanti BBVA, the country's second largest private bank. BBVA Corporate & Investment Banking has consolidated its position as one of the leading investment banks in Turkey after participating in three public bond placement transactions in the last two weeks.

These successful transactions stem from the strategy that BBVA CIB has implemented for the Credit business in Emerging Markets and, in particular, for Turkey and the Middle East. BBVA has a firm, long-term commitment to Turkey, demonstrated by the ambitious expansion plans for the region and the set-up of specialized teams with extensive experience and knowledge of the local market.

The collaboration between BBVA's teams in Europe, the US and BBVA Garanti's local teams has been key to the execution of these transactions taking advantage of the reopening of the bond markets in Turkey.

In this context, it is worth highlighting the placement of a 10-year bond for the Turkish Treasury, the country's sovereign issuer, with a total transaction value of 3,000 million dollars. BBVA CIB acted as an active bookrunner and represented the only non-US bank in the mandate. The transaction attracted record demand, which led to a very low cost of funding for the issuer that was below initial expectations.

The second transaction was the issuance of a five-year bond for the Turkey Wealth Fund (TWF), with a total value of 500 million dollars. This deal, in which BBVA acted as global coordinator and Joint Lead Manager, registered the second highest level of oversubscription of all Turkish transactions, with a demand of 7,200 million dollars, equivalent to more than 14 times the amount finally issued.

Third, BBVA acted as Joint Lead Manager in the placement of a seven-year bond for Eximbank, the export credit bank in Turkey, with a total transaction value of 500 million dollars, closing with a spread of just 375 basis points over the US Treasury bond.

In addition, BBVA CIB has also led several issuances in private credit markets for financial institutions with international investors in USD and Turkish lira, showing a great capacity to provide tailor-made advice to its clients for all types of financing needs.

Juan Blasco, Head of Global Credit Markets, highlighted the success of these transactions, which demonstrate "the excellent execution of our strategy, leveraged on global capabilities, and the added value we bring to our clients." He also pointed out that "these transactions give us a leading position in Turkey right now and we will continue to work to strengthen our presence across the region."