Swedes open up the cities

Issuer: City of Stockholm

Amount: $1 billion

Launched: April 7 1997

Arranger: Lehman Brothers

The long, midnight-sun hours of the Scandinavian summer lend themselves to thoughtful reflection. In the summer of 1996, treasury officials from the City of Stockholm were spending their evenings mulling over the idea of a Euro-MTN programme. By the time autumn began to close in, the idea had become concrete. On April 7, in the boardroom of Lehman Brothers’ London offices, representatives of Sweden’s capital city were putting their signatures to a $1 billion programme.