Manila's Energy Devt ups local bond sale to $251 mln

MANILA, Nov 3 (Reuters) - Philippine power producer Energy Development Corp (EDC) (EDC.PS) on Tuesday raised the amount of fixed-rate bonds it will sell to as much as 12 billion pesos ($251 million), to refinance maturing debt.

EDC, the country's largest geothermal energy producer, said in a regulatory filing it would sell 10 billion pesos worth of 5-½ and 7-year bonds, with an oversubscription option of 2 billion pesos.

The offer is higher than its original plan to sell 6 billion pesos of the local bonds, with an option to raise the offer to 10 billion pesos. [ID:nMNA002392]

The company, a unit of the Philippines' largest privately held power generation firm First Gen Corp (FGEN.PS), said it will use proceeds from the offer to refinance its outstanding yen loan, worth about 11 billion pesos, maturing on June 26, 2010.

Joint lead underwriters for the issue are BDO Capital & Investment Corp, RCBC Capital Corp, BPI Capital Corp and SB Capital Investment Corp.

Land Bank of the Philippines is co-lead underwriter while the Philippine unit of ING N.V. and Multinational Investment Bancorporation are participating underwriters.

($1= 47.73 pesos) (Reporting by Rosemarie Francisco; Editing by Lincoln Feast)