Addendum to First Question

Thanks to another loyal reader, I noticed an unacceptable error to my first question on blogger appreciation day:

I had started writing up that question towards the end of last week, right after the Reuters piece appeared. In fact, I had almost finished it, so just proofread and sent it hastily last night. But in the meantime, I totally forgot that Akbank had gone through with the issue, which was at 5.3% and 2.5 times oversubscribed. So apologies for the error; maybe, I should wear a t-shirt as well every time as I mess up.

By the way, I spoke to another loyal reader, who also happens to be an insider. She told me that in conversations with colleagues, they too thought that the borrowing was a bit on the expensive side. And although she is in completely different department, she was able to come up with the following reasons:

• The bond provides maturity match, which is an important advantage over deposits. ED: Sure, but you get that from syndicated lending as well.
• The amount is rather small for a bank of Akbank's size, so the bank might just be testing ground, i.e. getting the feel of it since bond issuance is its infancy.
• Related to the previous point, not getting sufficient demand would have been a loss of prestige, so the bank might have decided to play it safe this time around.