Allen & Overy said today the USD5.5 billion STAR Rafineri underlined growing demand from lenders to participate in Turkish infrastructure and energy financings.

The deal was not only significant because of its size – Turkey’s largest ever project financing – but also for the number of financial institutions and export credit agencies involved. Allen & Overy advised CESCE, Export Development Canada, JBIC, K-SURE, NEXI, SACE, US Ex-Im Bank and 16 commercial banks in one of the most complex multi-source financings ever to be brought to signing in Turkey.
 
Commenting, Charles Lindsay, managing partner of Allen & Overy’s Istanbul office, said: “This is the most significant deal we have worked on since opening our office in Istanbul in 2012. It marks a real watershed both in terms of our own progress in the Turkish legal market and of Turkey’s progress in the global energy and infrastructure market. Attracting the calibre of lenders it did for this deal is a real vote of confidence in the local market."
 
The Allen & Overy team was led by partners Charles Lindsay (Istanbul) and Lorraine Bayliss (London) with assistance from senior associate David Varnham and associates Sarah Waller and Jennifer Etherington in London and senior associate Joe Clinton and associates Seyda Duman and Chiraag Patel in Istanbul.