Kangaroo Bond

Kangaroo Bonds are Australian dollar-denominated bonds issued by non-resident companies in Australia. The kangaroo is an unofficial symbol of Australia. Aside from being featured on the Australian coat of arms, it also appears on some of the country’s banknotes.

This segment takes a significant share of the Australian bond market. It is the third largest segment of the bond market after government bonds and semi-government bonds. The majority of issuers are high-rated issuers, such as supranational and quasi-sovereign agencies, although the number of non-financial corporate issues has increased. Kangaroo bonds have been attractive to non-resident issuers as they enable non-residents to diversify their funding bases and have relatively favorable issuance costs compared with issuance in other currencies.

Kangaroo bond issuers also act as indirect counterparties for Australian corporations looking to convert their own funds. Most Kangaroo bonds issuers raise funds in Australian dollars and then convert them into their home currency.

The main reason why this is cost effective is that Australia has a surplus of businesses willing to convert foreign currency generated from their operations back into Australian dollars, generally to finance domestic projects. Kangaroo bond issuers can get the funding at a lower rate compared to the borrowing rate in their country of residence, as well as quickly convert Australian dollars into their home currency. The major issuers are: Asian Development Bank, Inter-American Development Bank, KfW, IBRD, Bank of Montreal and IFC.