SEBI’s new AT1 bond norms raised a storm among mutual funds

The decision of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) to slap restrictions on mutual fund (MF) investments in additional tier-1 (AT1) bonds has raised a storm in the MF and banking sectors.

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The Finance Ministry has asked the regulator to withdraw the changes as it could lead to disruption in the investments of mutual funds and the fund-raising plans of banks.

In a recent circular, the Sebi told mutual funds to value these perpetual bonds as a 100-year instrument. This essentially means MFs have to make the assumption that these bonds would be redeemed in 100 years.

The regulator also asked MFs to limit the ownership of the bonds at 10 per cent of the assets of a scheme.

AT1 Bonds stand for additional tier-1 bonds. These are unsecured bonds which have perpetual tenure. In other words, the bonds have no maturity date.

They have call option, which can be used by the banks to buy these bonds back from investors. These bonds are typically used by banks to bolster their core or tier-1 capital.

AT1 bonds are subordinate to all other debt and only senior to common equity. Mutual funds (MFs) are among the largest investors in perpetual debt instruments, and hold over Rs 35,000 crore of the outstanding additional tier-I bond issuances of Rs 90,000 crore.