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Rising Investor Confidence Fuels Caribbean Capital Markets
Analysis of the key transactions completed over the past year points to a Caribbean funding market that is expanding both its capacity and its range. Benchmark sovereign bonds have attracted multi-billion-dollar order books; corporate issuers have returned to the international market at meaningful scale; and regional lenders have supported increasingly complex infrastructure and acquisition financings. For the right issuer and structure, there is clear demand for size, tenor and sophistication.
The strongest evidence comes from sovereign issuance. The Dominican Republic raised US$2.75 billion through bonds due 2034 and 2038. The order book exceeded US$7.2 billion, around 2.6 times the amount issued, allowing the sovereign to tighten pricing significantly. This was the Republic’s 28th international market visit: a reminder that regular engagement and an established execution platform continue to matter.
Jamaica’s US$1 billion 2037 bond demonstrated how a Caribbean sovereign can navigate difficult conditions. It was Jamaica’s first international issue since 2023 and first US dollar bond since 2019, yet achieved the lowest coupon in its international borrowing history. This came despite a roughly 20bp rise in the ten-year US Treasury yield during the week. A four-day investor programme created sufficient momentum for Jamaica to move directly from initial price thoughts of 6.50% area to a 6.25% yield. The book reached approximately US$2.5 billion from more than 100 accounts.
Trinidad and Tobago achieved a similarly important result under negative rating outlooks. Its US$1 billion 2036 issue - the country’s largest international bond in a decade - attracted more than US$2.4 billion from over 140 investors. Pricing tightened by about 20bp and came approximately 54.6bp inside the Republic’s comparable 2016 issue. The result showed that investors will distinguish among Caribbean credits and support benchmark size where the financing strategy is credible.
The offshore market nevertheless remains relatively small, with access concentrated among sovereigns, multilaterals and a narrow group of established corporates. Issuance can be sporadic and liquidity limited. The significance of the past year’s transactions is that they have raised the ceiling, creating stronger reference points for the issuers that follow.
They have also demonstrated that liability management is becoming integral to execution rather than an optional addition. Jamaica used priority allocation codes to support simultaneous tenders for three outstanding bonds, retiring approximately US$491 million. Trinidad and Tobago addressed a US$1 billion maturity six months early, repurchasing almost US$593 million and extending the average life of its external debt from 4.1 to 6.3 years. For frequent issuers, the benchmark is increasingly not simply how much they raise, but how effectively a transaction reshapes the maturity profile.
There are encouraging signs beyond sovereigns. AES Dominicana’s US$500 million 2033 notes were the largest bond offering by a private Dominican company since 2012. The transaction refinanced both offshore notes and local bonds, using a Dutch issuing vehicle and guarantees from Dominican operating companies. It created a useful reference point for Caribbean corporate risk and showed that strategically important businesses can access benchmark-sized international funding.
The loan market is demonstrating comparable ambition. The Manzanillo gas-to-power financing brought together a 414MW plant, floating storage and regasification infrastructure, a gas pipeline and transmission connections. Twelve senior lenders from four countries provided US$500 million of 15-year debt, supplemented by a US$110 million subordinated tranche funded by a Dominican investment vehicle. Seven new lenders supplied US$137 million of fresh money. The deal showed that regional banks and domestic institutional capital can work together to finance infrastructure previously assumed to require a predominantly global lender group.
The US$1.475 billion Tortuga acquisition financing reinforces that point. A single New York-law facility supported the acquisition of 15 resorts across the Dominican Republic, Jamaica and Mexico, with security and execution coordinated across five jurisdictions. It demonstrated that hospitality assets - central to several Caribbean economies - can support sophisticated cross-border acquisition finance at scale.
Local-currency and risk-transfer markets are developing too. CABEI’s JMD5 billion seven-year private placement was its first Jamaican-dollar issue and one of the largest single supranational tranches in the offshore JMD market. It introduced a highly rated regional name and created scope for future reopenings. Separately, the US$150 million payout under Jamaica’s catastrophe bond demonstrated the practical value of transferring disaster risk to capital-market investors.
The opportunity now is to turn these individual precedents into repeatable funding channels. Earlier liability management, consistent investor engagement and a broader combination of international, regional and domestic capital can help Caribbean borrowers build on a year in which the market demonstrated considerably greater scale, confidence and sophistication.
Be part of the conversations shaping the future of Caribbean capital markets. Join us at Global Banking & Markets: Latin America & Caribbean 2027, taking place on 17–18 February in Miami, to explore emerging financing opportunities, connect with key decision-makers and gain insights into the region's evolving investment landscape.
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