J

akarta: Agents for the Indonesian government’s fourth retail sukuk (Islamic debt papers for individual investors) have raised their sales target by Rp 5.48 trillion (US$595.73 million) to Rp 19.15 trillion due to the strong demand from locals.

As of Tuesday, which was the seventh day of the sukuk’s offer period, 15,165 investors had applied for Rp 11.77 trillion worth of the bonds, Rahmat Waluyanto, the Finance Ministry’s director general for debt management, told The Jakarta Post.

“The government will allocate [the retail sukuk] to selling agents who are serving people with retail investor characteristics,” he said in a text message sent late Tuesday. There are 24 selling agents offering the retail sukuk from March 5 to March 16, comprising 13 top banks and 11 major securities firms.

The retail sukuk offers a 6.25-percent coupon rate per year paid monthly, with a minimum order of Rp 5 million and a maximum of Rp 5 billion.

The government issues debt papers to plug state budget deficits and finance physical development projects, such as roads and bridges. It has planned to issue about Rp 135 trillion worth of bonds this year, ranging from retail and institutional sukuk to short- to long-term regular papers.