Posted By thestatedtruth.com on March 17, 2010

March 17 (Bloomberg) — SLM Corp., the largest U.S. student-loan company, raised $1.5 billion in the bond market, paying more than it charges some borrowers to begin addressing $11 billion of bonds maturing through next year.

Sallie Mae, as the company is known, sold $1.5 billion of 8 percent notes due in 2020 at a yield of 8.25 percent, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Stafford federal loans disbursed between July 1, 2009, and June 30, 2010, have a fixed interest rate of 5.6 percent, according to the company’s Web site.

With $4.51 billion of bonds maturing this year and $6.44 billion in 2011, Sallie Mae is reestablishing access to unsecured debt markets. Sallie Mae hadn’t sold unsecured debt since a $2.5 billion offering of 10-year notes in June 2008. Its sale came after average yields fell to 3.978 percent yesterday, the lowest since Dec. 6, 2004, according to the Bank of America Merrill Lynch Global Broad Market Corporate index.

When the company issued asset-backed bonds linked to student loans on March 3, the debt priced to yield 325 basis points, or 3.25 percentage points, more than the London interbank offered rate, Bloomberg data show. Three-month Libor, a borrowing benchmark, was set at to 0.266 percent today.

More at……..http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aUltqUOk3dsE&pos=3

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