Standard Chartered Bank announced its success as Joint Sustainability Structuring Bank, Joint Bookrunner and Joint Lead Arranger for the issuance and offering of a 15-year 8-month sustainability-linked bond, or SLB, worth 25 billion baht under its updated sustainable financing framework. The offering drew strong demand from investors, with total orders exceeding 36.3 billion baht, or 1.45 times the offering size. The SLB425A bond is issued in baht in the domestic market and is linked to two sustainability indicators: reducing Thailand's net greenhouse gas emissions to 152 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent by 2035, or a 47 percent reduction from 2019 levels, and increasing protected land and inland freshwater areas, including biodiversity conservation areas outside protected zones, to cover no less than 30 percent of Thailand's total land area by 2030. This marks the first time a public-sector debt issuer in Asia has included a biodiversity target in its financing framework. The transaction ranks as the second-largest public-sector SLB in Asia, after Thailand's first public-sector SLB, and the fourth-largest in the world. Jindarat Viriyataveekul, Director-General of the Public Debt Management Office, said the bond will bring measurable sustainability goals into public debt management and serve as a new reference rate for Thai government bonds. Charles Corbett, Head of Sovereign and Public Sector Clients at Standard Chartered Bank, said the issuance helps strengthen the integration of sustainability dimensions into the country's core financing strategy. Rahul Sheth, Managing Director of Debt Markets and Head of Sustainable Bonds at Standard Chartered Bank, said the transaction aligns with Thailand's latest NDC 3.0 targets and supports the path toward net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. The issuance builds on Thailand's first SLB, which was the first public-sector SLB in Asia and the third in the world. That pioneering transaction, supported by Standard Chartered, raised more than 230 billion baht in local currency through multiple additional auctions.
Standard Chartered PLCStandard Chartered acted as Joint Sustainability Structuring Bank, Joint Bookrunner and Joint Lead Arranger for Thailand's 25bn baht SLB, a mandate that boosts its debt-market franchise.
