Japanese investors have snapped up a $223 million bond program to fund vaccination campaigns in developing countries. The idea is that the investors' money will be used to pay for the upfront costs of a campaign and they will be repaid as governments fund the programs. This is the first time that individual investors have bought into a vaccination bond program and it could prove a model for future fundraising efforts in other countries.
In this case, Japanese investors paid as little as $1,270 to buy into the issue from the International Finance Facility for Immunization. In 2006 the first IFFim bond raised $1 billion from institutions in London and underwritten by a group of countries including the UK.
- read the report from the Financial TimesÂ