EU bailout fund sees high demand for 5-year bonds

(FRANKFURT) - The EU's bailout fund, the EFSF, successfully placed 4.0 billion euros ($5.3 billion) in five-year bonds on Wednesday, with demand far outstripping the amount of bonds on offer.

The five-year bond offer, maturing on May 15, 2017, "was met with strong demand with orders received of approximately 12.8 billion euros from investors around the world," the European Financial Stability Facility said in a statement.

The yield was 2.061 percent.

Citigroup, Nomura and Unicredit acted as lead managers.

"Today's transaction completes a busy issuance schedule across the yield curve from the EFSF this week raising a total of 7.4 billion euros through three successful visits to the market," the EFSF said.

On Monday, the facility placed its first 20-year bond for an amount of 1.5 billion euros, followed by 1.9 billion euros of 6-month bills issued on Tuesday.

"All three transactions met with strong investor demand and were oversubscribed," the EFSF said.

"The market is back to a positive mood and investors have shown appetite for the EFSF from the short end through to the very long end. EFSF is successfully fulfilling its mandate to safeguard stability within the euro area," said deputy chief executive and chief financial officer Christophe Frankel.