Emirates NBD, the Gulf's largest lender by assets, plans to sell up to $2 billion of bonds in Japanese yen and Malaysian ringgit to help finance its regional and international expansion plans.

The Dubai-government controlled lender is putting in place programmes of around $1 billion in both currencies and will look to issue the bonds 'when the opportunity presents itself', Tony Bush, head of global funding for Emirates NBD said on Wednesday.

Issuance of the bonds, which are mainly going to be conventional, could be over two or three years and will target wholesale investors, he said, without elaborating.

'We are already the largest bank by assets in the Mena region and believe that the bank is very well placed to take advantage of the tremendous growth opportunities presented in the UAE and other GCC states,' Bush said.

'To meet this challenge we plan to build on our Abu Dhabi branch network and where we have already one service branch in Riyadh, others are planned. We are also upgrading our rep office in Singapore to a full branch so as to take advantage of the trade flows,' he said.

Sentiment has been improving in global credit markets over the past two months, with a slew of new issues being brought to market including ones by the Dubai government.-Reuters