Jamaica Money Market Brokers (JMMB) has raised US$20 million in a private placement to Jamaican investors.The company said in a statement posted to the Jamaica Stock Exchange: "JMMB has advised that it has raised US$20 million through the issue and private placement of unsecured extendible notes denominated in United States dollars. The offer was only available to Jamaican residents."The private placement offer closed on July 18 and will mature on July 18, 2016.
"Noteholders have an option to either redeem their notes on the maturity date or extend the maturity of their notes to July 18, 2019," JMMB said.The interest rate on the original note is 6.75 per cent fixed for two years and 7.75 per cent on the extended notes. JMMB, holds equity of $18.6 billion from $17.2 billion a year earlier, annual financials indicate.JMMB said in its annual report that market conditions led it to diversify its portfolio of overseas assets to clients.
"This was achieved as we added over 20 new sovereign, quasi-sovereign and corporate bonds covering the Caribbean and Latin America as a part of our offerings," the company said in audited annual financials released this week."As clients benefited from the outright ownership of assets we were able to increase trading gains from client brokering activity. Growth in US$ bond volumes for our retail clients increased year over year by 9.61 per cent or US$6.65 million," the company said.