The Shanghai municipal government announced Tuesday it has issued 4 billion yuan bond (about US$516 million) to fund the construction of the 2010 World Expo projects in the city.

The bond includes two billion yuan of 10-year securities with a fixed annual interest rate of 4.05 percent, and another two billion of 15-year bonds with a fixed 4.15 percent annual rate, said Bai Wenhua, president of the Shanghai World Expo Land Holding Co., the bond issuer.

The bond is part of the total 8 billion yuan (about US$1.03 billion) world expo bond to finance expo-related projects, said Bai.

The first batch of the bond worth 1.5 billion yuan (about US$193 million), had been sold from December 2005 to January 2006 in Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen.

According to Bai, 97 percent of the bond, worth 3.88 billion yuan, has been sold out to institutional buyers, and the rest 120 million yuan are being sold to personal buyers.

The bond sales will end on March 1.

The Shanghai World Expo is scheduled to be held from May 1 to October 31 in 2010. More than 200 countries and international organizations and over 70 million visitors are expected to attend the exposition.

The expo organizing committee estimated the total budge of the event to be 10.6 billion yuan (about US$1.37 billion).

(Xinhua News Agency February 28, 2007)