The red hot bond market greeted The Nielsen Company with open arms as the broadcast ratings and consumer research company sold an issue of $750 million in new bonds. That was bumped up from the planned $500 million by strong demand.
The private placement of three-quarters of a billion dollars in senior notes due 2018 was priced with an interest rate of 7.75%. The sale was led by Deutsche Bank Securities, Credit Suisse Securities, JP Morgan Securities and Morgan Stanley. Nielsen will now file a registration statement within the next 360 days so that the privately-placed bonds can be swapped for some with identical terms which can be traded publicly.
Nielsen still has a $2 billion stock IPO pending. When that will be priced remains uncertain, since the market for bonds has been so much stronger than for new stock.
RBR-TVBR observation: Wow! There seems to be no quenching of Wall Street’s thirst for bonds.
