KARACHI (April 04 2007): Pakistan on Tuesday appointed Citigroup, Deutsche Bank and HSBC to jointly manage its sovereign offshore bond this fiscal year ending on June 30, a senior government official said.

The planned issue will be Pakistan''s fourth foray into the international debt market since 2004, when it returned to the arena for the first time since economic sanctions were imposed for conducting nuclear tests in 1998.

"We have selected the three to jointly manage the transaction," said Ashfaque Hasan Khan, director general of the Finance Ministry''s debt office. He did not give any details on the size and type of the transaction, saying it would be discussed with the lead managers.

"We will hold a kick-off meeting between April 7 and April 10 to discuss the planned issue," he told Reuters. Last year Pakistan sold $800 million in a dual-tranche sovereign bond, comprising $500 million in a 10-year issue and $300 million in 30-year paper.

Banking sources said the government was likely to opt for 144A-type paper-a clause that makes the securities eligible for purchase and trade by institutional US investors-while the size was likely to be between $800 million and $1 billion.

The government is also likely to test a different point in the yield curve this time, and thus it may go for a 15- or 20-year issue, analysts and bankers said. In 2004 Pakistan issued a $500 million, five-year eurobond, while in 2005 it floated a $600 million Islamic bond, also for a five-year term.