American Chemical Society issues bonds to support retirement fund

WASHINGTON, May 15, 2020 — The American Chemical Society (ACS), leveraging its strong financial position and credit rating, to issue bonds next week as a major step to ensure the future stability of its Defined Benefit Retirement Plan (DBRP). Proceeds from the bond sale will fully fund the pension program, a long-standing goal for the Society.

The transaction reinforces ACS’ commitment to DBRP participants to provide this important retirement benefit. It also enables ACS to more confidently plan its finances years into the future. Current beneficiaries will not see any changes in benefits as a result of this action.

ACS was assigned a rating of Aa3 from Moody’s Investors Service in late April with a stable outlook. With this solid credit rating in hand, the Society will issue $61 million in bonds to shore up the retirement plan, which was closed to new enrollments in 2007. Further accruals to the DBRP were discontinued in 2009, with all DBRP participants transitioned to a defined contribution retirement plan at that time.

Planning for this transaction began prior to the current COVID-19 pandemic. Despite the impacts of this situation, ACS’ strong financial position allowed it to move forward and take advantage of historically low interest rates.

The American Chemical Society (ACS) is a nonprofit organization chartered by the U.S. Congress. ACS’ mission is to advance the broader chemistry enterprise and its practitioners for the benefit of Earth and its people. The Society is a global leader in providing access to chemistry-related information and research through its multiple research solutions, peer-reviewed journals, scientific conferences, eBooks and weekly news periodical Chemical & Engineering News. ACS journals are among the most cited, most trusted and most read within the scientific literature; however, ACS itself does not conduct chemical research. As a specialist in scientific information solutions (including SciFinder^® and STN^®), its CAS division powers global research, discovery and innovation. ACS’ main offices are in Washington, D.C., and Columbus, Ohio.