LOS ANGELES — The California treasurer's office estimates the state garnered $204.7 million of present value savings on its $1.93 billion combined new money/refunding general obligation sale last week.
The offering priced Wednesday for institutions after a one-day retail order period. Retail orders comprised almost $380 million of bonds sold.
The sale included $1.38 billion in refunding bonds to refinance about $1.54 billion of existing debt and $550 million in new money.
"I am very pleased at the result of this sale, which will save taxpayers such a substantial sum over the remaining life of the refinanced debt," California Treasurer John Chiang said in a prepared statement.
The sales results were particularly favorable, according to Chiang, given the tremendous volatility in global equity and debt markets over the past several weeks.
"In the face of this volatility, which saw unusual swings in bond yields, the issue met with good success," Chiang said. "Recent credit upgrades have increased the market's confidence in the state's credit worthiness and individual and institutional investors alike continued to demonstrate faith in California."
The state holds credit ratings of Aa3, AA-minus, and A-plus from Moody's Investors Service, Standard & Poor's and Fitch Ratings, respectively. The state was last upgraded by Moody's in June 2014; Standard & Poor's in July 2015; and, Fitch Ratings in February 2015.
The final re-offering yields ranged from a low of 0.175% for a 2016 maturity to a high of 3.47% on the 5% coupon and 3.95% on the 4% coupons for a 30-year maturity.
The next state general obligation bond sale is slated for October.
