Ashurst advised a consortium comprising the Bayerische Landesbank, Commerzbank Aktiengesellschaft, Landesbank Baden-Württemberg, SEB AG and The Governor and Company of the Bank of Ireland on the refinancing and recapitalisation of the existing credit facilities of the cosmetic supplier GEKA Holding GmbH (GEKA). The banks provided GEKA with a total package of €95 million.
HONG KONG; Hogan Lovells has advised the syndicate of lenders on US$2.45 billion five-year term and revolving facilities to Tencent Asset Management Limited ("Tencent") in Tencent's second major syndicated loan, which involved 19 lenders.
DLA Piper Prague has advised UniCredit Leasing, a subsidiary of UniCredit Bank, on the sale of a real estate portfolio held by the Baumax group. The sale constituted part of a debt restructuring process. The transaction was part of a larger sale of a real estate owned or used by Baumax.
Linklaters has advised a club of banks on a €557 million loan agreement for EuroChem’s ammonia project in Russia. The facility, which is structured as a limited-recourse €557 million 13.5 year project finance facility, benefits from insurance cover provided by the Italian Export Credit Agency SACE in respect of both political and commercial risks.
Clifford Chance advised UniCredit Bank AG on the securitisation of German mortgage backed SME loans in an amount of EUR 2.5 billion.
The loans were sold by UniCredit Bank AG to Rosenkavalier 2015 UG (haftungsbeschränkt), a German special purpose vehicle which in turn financed the purchase by issuing two classes of notes, with the senior class satisfying the requirements of the European Central Bank for eligible collateral.
Julius Baer has redeemed the outstanding one million Non-cumulative Guaranteed Perpetual Preferred Securities with a liquidation preference amount of CHF 225 per security (the "Preferred Securities") on 2 December 2015. The total of one million Preferred Securities, which are not Basel III-compliant, was issued in December 2005 in connection with the acquisition of the SBC Wealth Management Group (UBS Private Banks and GAM) by the former Julius Baer Holding Ltd. The obligations related thereto were assumed by Julius Baer Group Ltd. in 2009.
Darrois Villey Maillot Brochier advised The Carlyle Group, when he entered into exclusive discussions with Astorg in order to acquire a majority controlling stake in the group Saverglass, a high-end producer of bottles and carafes for the premium spirit, fine wine and perfume markets.
The exclusive discussions between The Carlyle Group and Astorg are made alongside the management of Saverglass.
The offer is subject to the consultation process of the relevant French employee works’ councils as well as antitrust authorities approvals.
Watson Farley & Williams (“WFW”) has advised the investors, Macquarie Corporate and Asset Finance as arranger, SFM Trustees Limited as security and bond trustee and Elavon Financial Limited as cash manager on the launch of an innovative, first-in-kind, capital markets transaction for Virgin Atlantic.
Nabarro has advised Business Loan Network Limited t/a ThinCats, the leading UK-based peer to peer lending platform focused on providing secured loans to SMEs, on the acquisition of a 73.4% stake in the company by European Speciality Finance Capital (ESF). Under the deal, ThinCats founder and Managing Director, Kevin Caley, will become chairman while co-founder Peter Brown will remain as finance director. ESF CEO John Mould will also become CEO of ThinCats.
De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek has advised SNS Bank on reaching an agreement with NIBC Bank on the acquisition of SNS Securities.