BSB RAISES P110 M THROUGH BOND LISTING

In the first year of its listing on the Botswana Stock Exchange (BSE), the state owned bank, Botswana Savings Bank (BSB) raised P110 million through the bond scheme. Last year, the BSE urged government to list some of the State owned Enterprises as an addition to its revenue streams. According to BSE Market Performance Report for 2022, BSB performance is likely to inspire confidence in more State Owned Enterprises (SOEs) and serve as a demonstration that capital markets are a viable source of long term capital, accessible through different types of instruments. BSE Chief Executive Officer, Thapelo Tsheole highlighted that government is expected to remain active in the domestic bond market and tap into the P30 billion Bond Programme to issue more bonds on the BSE. “It is already evident that SOEs are heeding the call as Botswana Savings Bank (BSB) debut in the capital markets by registering a P1 billion Domestic Note Programme in 2022, from which it has raised P110.05 million.” Government will be implementing the SOE Rationalisation Strategy that will strengthen corporate governance and practises of SOE, hopefully translating into better financial performance, readiness and attractiveness of SOEs when accessing debt markets, ultimately weaning them from Government grants and subventions. The BSE report indicated that four bonds were redeemed at maturity in 2022 being DPCF006, FNBB006, BDCL002 and RDCP004 which were issued by Debt Participation Capital Funding, First National Bank Botswana, Botswana Development Corporation and RDC Properties

respectively. The recent revision of the BSE Debt Listings Requirements introduced the rules for listing Commercial Paper and mandates that all issuances under a BSE approved Programme Memorandum shall be listed. The main rationale is to leverage the BSE’s regulatory environment to enhance financial stability, provide safety and custody of assets, increase transparency, data and access to pricing and valuation in respect of assets belonging to the public. Bank of Botswana (BoB) continued to issue additional tranches of existing bonds through the monthly auctions, helping Government raise P3.1 billion through bonds in 2022, and increased from the P2.7 billion raised in 2021. Government raised P8.9 billion through the issuance of treasury bills and a total of P12 billion was raised which comprised of bonds and bills in 2022.