Tokyo Gas Co., the nation's biggest natural gas distributor, will sell the most bonds in a decade to help fund a ¥2.06 trillion spending plan and take advantage of coupons at an eight-year low.
Offerings this year will exceed ¥60 billion, or 50 percent more than it sold in 2011, Masaru Nishimura, the utility's general manager of finance, said in an interview in Tokyo on Jan. 6. The amount will be the company's largest debt issuance since 1999, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Tokyo Gas is expanding its investments in liquefied natural gas at a time when the March 11 earthquake-tsunami disaster and nuclear meltdown shut down atomic plants, making electric utility bonds unattractive to investors. The company last month sold 20-year bonds that pay 1.852 percent, the lowest coupons for similar maturity notes since June 2003, when it paid 1.01 percent. Hong Kong & China Gas Co.'s 15-year notes had a coupon of 3.625 percent.