The Saudi/French joint venture Saudi Aramco Total Refining and Petrochemical Company (Satorp) has completed the issue of a SR3.7bn ($1bn) Islamic bond (sukuk) to fund the development of its refinery in Jubail.

The sukuk was launched on 16 October after being 3.5 times oversubscribed and pricing was set at 95 basis points above the six-month Saudi interbank offered rate (Sibor).

The deal was arranged by the local Samba and Banque Saudi Fransi, and Germany’s Deutsche Bank.

In total, the Satorp project will cost about $14bn to develop. Once the sukuk is in place, it is expected to be used to scale back the loans in a nearly $3.5bn commercial bank tranche of the project’s financing (MEED 13:09:11).