Dubai – Mubasher: Emirates Islamic Bank has closed the $500 million Sukuk issued from its $2.5 billion Certificate Issuance Programme.

The five-year Sukuk issuance was listed on Nasdaq Dubai and Euronext Dublin’s Regulated Market, attracting strong demand from investors, according to a press release on Sunday.

Oversubscribed 2.4 times, the issuance has recorded an order book of $1.2 billion, enabling the bank to tighten the spread on the Sukuk by 25 basis points from initial guidance and resulting in a profit rate of 2.082% per year.

This pricing is the lowest spread paid by a UAE bank since 2008 for a US dollar benchmark public debt issuance.

The bank's CEO, Salah Amin, said: "The oversubscription and tight pricing of the issue demonstrates the strong investor confidence in our financials and growth outlook as well as the favourable outlook for the UAE economy."

Amin added: "The response from regional and global investors has been tremendous and we see this as a positive endorsement of the Bank’s credit strength and investor proposition."

It is noteworthy to mention that during the first nine months of 2021, the bank recorded net profits of AED 804.238 million, against net losses of AED 311.238 million in the year-ago period.