Thailand Bond House: Kasikornbank

IFR Asia Awards 2023
2 min read
Asia
Sara Velezmoro

One step ahead

Kasikornbank stood out from its competitors in 2023 for successfully navigating a dampened market environment and leading the year’s flagship Thai baht trades.

Overall bond volume in Thailand was down 26.6% in 2023, yet Kasikornbank managed to print a healthy Bt135.7bn (US$4bn) of deals. That kept it on top of the Thai baht bond league table with a 14.1% market share.

The weaker market was not just the result of high rates and global macroeconomic conditions, but also due to high-profile corporate default events that dented investor appetite. These included industrial cable maker Stark’s accounting scandal in June and Miss Universe owner JKN Global’s bankruptcy filing in November.

Tailor-made solutions such as shorter tenors and the use of digital channels showed KBank’s ability to adapt to changing market conditions and find the right solutions to maximise demand.

KBank won roles on all the year’s most notable transactions, including a record Bt31.5bn issuance in April by Ek-Chai Distribution Systems, owner of Thai retail chain Lotus’s, that included a 1.5-year tranche, a tenor not common in the Thai market, alongside a more typical three-year, to address investor demand for shorter exposure.

It found demand for subordinated perpetual bonds for Charoen Pokphand Foods, utility B Grimm Power and hotel company Minor International, even as high rates made such hybrid deals challenging.

The bank was sole bookrunner for sizable trades from the likes of Berli Jucker, WHA Real Estate Management, Muangthai Capital and JMT Network Services.

It played an important role in market development, too. KBank self-led a ¥11.7bn (US$80.4m) digital bond private placement that marked the first foreign currency digital bond under the Thai Securities and Exchange Commission’s new Digital Infrastructure Sandbox initiative. It was the sole bank to be on all four 2023 transactions approved by the SEC in the initiative’s first phase.

KBank has been a strong advocate for ESG bonds in the Thai market, working closely with first-time and existing issuers. In 2023, KBank led Gulf Energy’s Bt20bn green bond and WHA Utilities and Power’s Bt500m green bond and continued to lay the groundwork with other borrowers for future issuance.

Despite the competitive marketplace and challenges facing the bond market, the bank aims to stay one step ahead of the competition.

“We always aim to be number one. I think we need to do more of what we have done so far – tailor more to issuer and investor needs,” said Jarujan Kongmeesook, senior debt capital market executive.

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