Saudi Arabia said to announce dollar sukuk sale soon

Saudi Arabia is planning to announce shortly a potential US dollar-denominated sukuk deal, Reuters reported, citing unnamed sources.

While the sukuk size has not been finalized and depends on market appetite, it is unlikely to match the Kingdom's previous jumbo debt transactions.

The planned issue will be the Kingdom's second international sukuk, following a $9 billion debut deal last year.

In the past two years, the Kingdom has raised $50 billion through international conventional and Islamic bonds.

On Tuesday, Saudi Arabia’s Islamic Development Bank, a multilateral development bank, said it hired banks for a five-year benchmark sukuk. 

Apicorp, an entity owned by the 10 members of the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries, is also tapping the market with its five-year conventional bond offering, the report added.