Ford prices split-rated tap; Westpac offers dollar notes; heavy high-grade volume in pipeline

By Cristal Cody

Tupelo, Miss., Nov. 12 – New issuance in the high-grade primary market on Tuesday included a $237 million reopening of Ford Motor Credit Co. LLC’s 5.113% notes due May 3, 2029.

The split-rated notes priced nearly 60 basis points wider than where the issue came in April.

Westpac Banking Corp. also offered new registered fixed-rate notes during the session.

Heavy investment-grade supply is expected this week with a looming deal of as much as $30 billion from AbbVie Inc., sources report.

About $45 billion to $50 billion of high-grade bond bonds are forecast to price this week, sources said.

The bond markets were closed on Monday for the Veterans Day holiday.

Market sources anticipate AbbVie in the primary market early this week after completing fixed income investor calls on Friday.

AbbVie plans to bring a Rule 144A and Regulation S private offering of senior notes (Baa2/A-/) with proceeds slated to fund its acquisition of Allergan plc.

BofA Securities, Inc., Barclays and Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC are the lead managers.

A bond deal also is anticipated early this week from toy and game maker Hasbro, Inc. (Baa1/BBB+/BBB-) as part of funding requirements for a $4 billion all-cash acquisition of Entertainment One Ltd., a source said.

Hasbro held fixed income investor calls on Thursday via BofA Securities, Citigroup Global Markets Inc. and J.P. Morgan Securities LLC.

Elsewhere, a number of high-grade issuers are holding fixed income investor calls this month with potential supply to follow, sources report.

On Tuesday, Genpact Ltd. subsidiary Genpact Luxembourg S.a.r.l. (Baa3/BBB-/) held fixed-income investor calls via Citigroup, Morgan Stanley and Wells Fargo Securities LLC, a source said.

Genpact is a Luxembourg-based global professional process services firm.

The Markit CDX North American Investment Grade 33 index closed the day mostly unchanged from Friday at a spread of 51.7 bps.

Ford Motor Credit reopens notes

Ford Motor Credit placed $237 million add-on to its 5.113% notes due May 3, 2029 (Ba1/BBB-/BBB) on Tuesday at a spread of Treasuries plus 318 bps, according to an FWP filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The notes priced at 100.124 to yield 5.096%.

J.P. Morgan and Morgan Stanley were the bookrunners.

The notes were first sold in a $1.25 billion offering on April 30 at par to yield a Treasuries plus 260 bps spread. The total outstanding is now $1,487,000,000.

Ford Motor Credit is the financing arm of Dearborn, Mich.-based automaker Ford Motor Co.

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