The first convertible from Korea in nearly a year was priced last night Tuesday under the sole lead of Morgan Stanley. LG Electronics LGE raised $250 million from a three-year deal, which the company will use to help reduce its gearing levels from nearly 200%.
With Korean bond spreads recently weakened by oversupply concerns, a convertible structure seems to have made far more sense than a high yield bond, which would have extended the group's maturity profile.
Firstly, there are only eight outstanding benchmark equity-linked deals from Korea, of which the most recent was an SK Corp exchangeable last summer. Secondly the global CB market is currently on fire. But thirdly,...
