Finance Minister Colm Imbert says data so far on the NIF2 $400million 5-year bond issue, shows that it has been a tremendous success.

It says NIF2 uses assets acquired from Clico.

The Ministry says as of yesterday, total applications for NIF2 bonds had crossed one billion dollars, inclusive of over $700 million in applications from a total of 3,644 individual investors.

It adds that more applications are yet to be tallied, and believes when the final tally is done, the oversubscription may cross 170%.

The Ministry says, “The success of NIF2 is an overwhelming vote of confidence in the National Investment Fund and by extension a vote of confidence in the Government’s management of the assets acquired by the Government in return for the money spent in the Clico bailout. Since inception NIF has paid all semi-annual interest due on all NIF bonds on time and also paid bondholders in full for the first 5-year Series A NIF bonds when they matured in August 2023.”

It adds, “After the winding up in 2023 of the Clico Investment Fund (CIF), which was backed by 25% of the issued shares in Republic Financial Holdings Limited (RFHL), NIF acquired a further 3.9% in RFHL, taking it to 29.9% of RFHL. These additional shares in RFHL were the basis for NIF2.”