Alphabet seeks US$9.4 billion from sterling, Swiss franc bond sales

[LONDON] Alphabet is selling at least US$9.4 billion in sterling and Swiss franc-denominated bonds, including an ultra-rare issue of a 100-year note, following a bumper deal in the US.

The sterling offering is expected to be a record £4.5 billion (S$7.8 billion) and includes tenors of three to 32 years, as well as the 100-year bond, said sources who asked to be anonymised. The Google parent drew a record £24 billion of bids, they added.

The Swiss offering will be a minimum of 2.5 billion Swiss francs (S$4.1 billion) across maturities of three, six, 10, 15 and 25 years.

Jack Daley, a portfolio manager at TwentyFour Asset Management, said: “The market in Europe will be able to absorb this supply.” For the sterling offering, “there will be a large demand and especially as a deal of this size will become a larger portion of the index”.

On Monday, Alphabet raised US$20 billion in a seven-part US dollar debt sale, exceeding earlier expectations of a US$15 billion deal. It attracted more than US$100 billion of orders at its peak – among the strongest for a corporate bond offering.

That set the tone for Monday’s offerings. All of the dollar tranches have gained in value on the secondary market, “showing there is very much demand for these names”, he added.

The previous record corporate bond sale in the sterling market came from National Grid in 2016 with a £3 billion four-part sale, while in the Swiss market Roche Holding raised a record three billion Swiss francs in a 2022 deal.

The mega debt spree comes after Alphabet said its capital expenditures will reach as much as US$185 billion in 2026 – double what it spent last year – to finance its ambitions in artificial intelligence.

Other tech firms, including Meta Platforms and Microsoft, have also announced huge spending plans for 2026, while Morgan Stanley expects borrowing by the massive cloud-computing companies known as hyperscalers to reach US$400 billion this year, up from US$165 billion in 2025.

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Still, those massive borrowing needs have started to raise some concerns about the potential pressure on bond valuations.

100-year bond

Alphabet’s 100-year note is the first sale with such an extreme maturity by a technology firm since Motorola sold this type of debt in 1997, based on data compiled by Bloomberg.

The market for 100-year bonds is dominated by governments and institutions such as universities. For corporates, potential acquisitions, outdated business models and technological obsolescence make such deals a rarity.

Alex Ralph, co-portfolio manager of Nedgroup Investments Global Strategic Bond Fund, said: “I could not justify taking such a long maturity bond in most companies – especially not one subject to an ever-changing landscape.”

She added: “100-year bonds tend to have a habit of calling the top of a market as well.”

Still, the demand from UK pension funds and insurers has made the sterling market a go-to venue for issuers seeking longer-dated funding.

Global corporates have also been turning to the Swiss franc bond market in recent years, to diversify their debt-raising programmes. In 2025, US firms including Thermo Fisher Scientific and construction equipment maker Caterpillar sold Swiss franc debt.

Alphabet tapped the euro bond market as recently as November, raising 6.5 billion euros (S$9.8 billion). That deal, added to an issue earlier in the year, made it the biggest borrower in the euro market in 2025, based on data compiled by Bloomberg.

Bank of America, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase are arranging both offerings, with Barclays, HSBC and NatWest Group also on the sterling deal. BNP Paribas and Deutsche Bank are on the Swiss franc issue. BLOOMBERG