NEW YORK (Bloomberg) - Bank of America Corp. is marketing perpetual preferred shares at the highest yields the company has paid on a new offering of such debt in 15 years.

The securities may yield eight percent to 8.125 percent, according to a person familiar with the sale who declined to be identified because terms are not set. Bank of America, the second-largest US bank by assets, in December 1992 sold $237.5 million of perpetual preferred shares with a dividend of 8.5 percent, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Bank of America joins Citigroup Inc. and other banks shoring up capital after reporting $133 billion in asset writedowns and credit losses tied to last year's collapse of the US sub-prime mortgage market.

Citigroup, the biggest US bank, last week sold $18.65 billion of debt, including $3.25 billion of perpetual preferred stock at a yield of 8.125 percent, Bloomberg data show.

Charlotte, North Carolina-based Bank of America is also selling convertible preferred shares that may pay a dividend of 7.25 percent to 7.75 percent and carry a conversion premium of 20 percent to 25 percent, said the person,

The total size of Bank of America's sale, scheduled for yesterday, will be $6 billion, the company said on Wednesday in a statement. Proceeds will be used for general purposes, it said.

Bank of America on January 22 said its fourth-quarter earnings dropped 95 percent after $5.28 billion of mortgage-related writedowns and higher provisions for future loan losses. CEO Kenneth Lewis said he wants to rebuild the bank's Tier 1 capital ratio, which measures its ability to cover losses, to 8 percent of assets. The ratio was 6.87 percent as of December 31, compared with 8.64 percent at the end of 2006.