The Federal Government of Nigeria has formally launched an open competitive bidding process for financial advisers, plotting its first public Eurobond sale since a blockbuster issuance late last year proved that global bond desks are willing to back the West African nation’s sweeping currency reforms.
According to a formal request for expressions of interest released by the Debt Management Office (DMO) on Monday, global investment banks, local bookrunners, and top-tier international law firms have until July 13 to submit detailed advisory proposals.
The planned international bond float comes on the heels of a significant ratings victory. S&P Global Ratings raised Nigeria’s sovereign credit rating by one notch to B, marking the country’s first upgrade in 14 years.
S&P cited sustained revenue tailwinds from elevated regional crude pricing, expanded domestic refining capacity led by the commercialization of the Dangote mega-refinery, and the central bank’s aggressive liberalization of the foreign currency market.
The Dual-Track Funding Framework: Swaps vs. Bonds
The prospective Eurobond issuance is part of a sophisticated, dual-track external financing framework engineered by President Bola Tinubu’s administration to finance the 2026 budget deficit and refinance expensive short-term domestic obligations.
To bypass the elevated pricing penalties historically demanded by the international capital markets for public frontier debt, Abuja has quietly built out a massive secondary liquidity line via the derivatives market: a $5 billion total return swap (TRS) facility arranged with First Abu Dhabi Bank (FAB) PJSC.
People familiar with the transaction confirmed that Nigeria has executed its first major utilization under the FAB facility, drawing down roughly $1.5 billion over the past two weeks.
Nigeria in November sold $2.35 billion of 10- and 20-year dollar bonds, after attracting bids for more than five times that amount.
The planned Eurobond offering signals Nigeria’s continued effort to access international capital markets following its credit rating upgrade and the successful drawdown from the UAE swap facility. The strong demand in November’s issuance suggests investors remain receptive to Nigeria’s debt instruments despite the country’s fiscal pressures.
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