Al-Rajhi Bank has signed its debut syndicated murabaha facility, lead-arranged by a group of six banks.

The deal was increased in size to $500 million from $300 million due to oversubscription, in spite of difficulties encountered with sharia-compliant structuring while bringing it to market.

The mandated lead arrangers (MLAs) were Arab Bank, Calyon, Gulf International Bank (GIB), Malayan Banking Berhad, Standard Chartered Bank (SCB) and WestLB. Calyon was the financial adviser, GIB was the facility agent and SCB was the documentation bank.

The tenor is three years (MEED 11:11:05).

Joining at syndication were Arab Banking Corporation, Banco Populare di Verona, DBS, Deutsche Bank, Export-Import Bank of China, HSH Nord, JP Morgan, Mashreqbank, Natexis Banques Populaires, Qatar National Bank, Raiffeisen Zentralbank, Societe Generale and UBAF.