Privately held ride-sharing company Uber Technologies Inc is sounding out investors on a $1.5 billion bond sale to raise capital, a report by Bloomberg said.
Uber is reportedly looking to sell the debt in a private placement available to a small group of institutional investors, according to people who asked not to be named discussing a confidential deal.
By not going to the bond market, Uber will disclose its financial information to a small, limited pool of potential investors.
The report said Uber may offer $500 million of five-year notes and $1 billion of eight-year bonds.
The shorter-term notes, which the company can not buy back for two years, may yield about 7.5% and the longer-dated securities, which can not be bought back for three years, may yield around 8%, the people said.
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The bond sale may come as early as next week. It is being offered as fixed-income investors have proven receptive to debt deals backed by cash-burning technology companies.
Uber reported a loss of $891 million in the second quarter. Sales rose 63% to $2.8 billion in that period compared with a year earlier.
Earlier this year, the company took a similar approach when it tapped the leveraged loan market in a financing it led itself.
Tech companies have become the second-biggest issuer of leveraged loans this year, having sold almost $170 billion, according to data put together by Bloomberg.
WeWork Cos offered its inaugural junk-bond deal in April and Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) sold $1.8 billion of notes last year.
Uber is a ridesharing, taxi cab, food delivery, bicycle-sharing, and transportation network company. The company operates in about 785 metropolitan areas around the world.
The company is based in San Francisco, California.