Pfizer to tap bond market for $10.6 bn

MADRID: Pfizer Inc, the world largest drugmaker, will raise $10.6 billion from its first sale of bonds in euros since 2007 and from a debut issue in UK pounds.

Pfizer is selling 1.85 billion euros ($2.6 billion) of four-year bonds, 2 billion euros of seven-year notes, and 2 billion euros of 12-year debt, according to a banker involved with the deal, who declined to be identified before the sale is completed. The New York-based firm is also issuing 1.5 billion pounds of debt due in 2038, the banker said.

Pharma companies are tapping the debt markets to finance mergers and acquisitions, taking advantage of investor appetite for investment-grade corporate bonds. Drugmakers and healthcare service providers have offered $20 billion of bonds in euros and pounds this year, compared with an equivalent $1.2 billion in all of 2008, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

���Pfizer is a rare issuer,��� said Ivan Comerma, head of treasury and capital markets at Banc Internacional-Banca Mora in Andorra, who plans to buy some of the notes.

Pfizer said in January that it would buy rival Wyeth of Madison, in a deal valued at about $62 billion. Roche Holding AG, the Basel, Switzerland-based drugmaker, in February raised about $40 billion in bond sales worldwide to help fund its takeover of San Francisco-based Genentech Inc.