Colombia: Bavaria SA, Colombia's largest brewery, plans to sell 350 billion pesos ($136 million) worth of 10-year bonds backed by barley forward contracts to help prepay debt, a spokesman said. The bonds will be sold today to yield a maximum of 7.5 percentage points above the consumer price index, which was about 6 percent through September, Bavaria said in a statement published in the daily El Tiempo. Bavaria spokesman Carlos German Quintero said it would be Colombia's first securitization of barley forward contracts. The securities backed by forward contracts on barley, a raw ingredient for beer, may lure investors who otherwise might buy corporate and government bonds, said Carlos Silva, head of research at Ultrabursatiles SA brokerage in Bogota. Similar transactions in recent years have included sales of bonds backed by sugar forwards, Bavaria's Quintero said. Bavaria purchases about 212 thousand tonnes of malting barley per year.

27 October, 2004