Ashurst has been acknowledged in three prize-winning deals at the PFI Awards, held on 30 January in London. The awards were presented in recognition of the Lundin Petroleum financing, Carrington Power's CCGT development and Agility trains consortium's financing of the Intercity Express Programme (IEP).
Ashurst has advised an affiliate of GE Energy Financial Services in relation to a US$20 million borrowing base facility for Trap Oil. The three-year facility is designed to fund development and production expenditure in relation to, inter alia, the group's Athena and Crazy Horse assets in the UK North Sea. In conjunction with the facility, Trap Oil entered into certain hedging arrangements with BP.
Nabarro continues to advise on major AIM-related M&A having advised on the proposed merger between Bayfield Energy Holdings, an upstream oil and gas exploration and production company with interests in Trinidad & Tobago and South Africa, with Trinity Exploration & Production.
Trinity is a leading private independent oil and gas company with onshore and offshore assets in Trinidad. The merger will create the largest independent oil and gas exploration and production company focused on Trinidad and is expected to create a business valued around £140m on AIM.
Clifford Chance Paris advised the lead managers (HSBC, Citibank, BNP Paribas and the other banks in the syndicate) on the issue by Electricité de France of 2.5 billion euros (in two tranches) and 1.25 billion pounds sterling of hybrid subordinated perpetual bonds.
These issues constitute a world record since this is the largest amount of hybrid bonds ever issued by a corporate.
Ashurst acted for Landesbank Baden-Württemberg, HSH Nordbank AG and WGZ Bank on the financing of the acquisition of a stake in Kautex Maschinenbau GmbH (Kautex) by funds advised by Capiton AG and the Kautex management. The stake was sold by private equity firm Steadfast Capital for an undisclosed consideration.
Watson, Farley & Williams (“WFW”), a leading international law firm, is pleased to announce that it has advised NORD/LB Norddeutsche Landesbank Girozentrale („NORD/LB“) on the financing of the Krughütte solar farm, which has a total capacity of 30 MWp and a total investment volume of approximately €45 million.
Slaughter and May advised Deutsche Bank A.G., London Branch, Qatar National Bank S.A.Q. and Emirates NBD Bank P.J.S.C. as initial mandated lead arrangers in connection with a US$1,030,000,000 secured syndicated term loan facility for Saudi Oger Limited and Oger Middle East (Holding) Limited as borrowers under the facility. The facility has a tenor of four years and is secured over certain Jordan-based assets held by the borrowers.
Slaughter and May advised Close Brothers Limited, a UK bank, in connection with the renewal of its £75m bilateral revolving credit facility provided by The Royal Bank of Scotland Plc. The facility has an initial tenor of one year, subject to an option for Close Brothers to request an extension of the facility for an additional period of six months.
Contacts
Financing: Miranda Leung (partner), Harry Bacon (associate); Tax: Mike Lane (partner), Owen Williams (associate)
Linklaters has acted as global counsel for the lenders on the closing of the landmark US$1.4bn equivalent multi currency limited recourse project financing of the Jorf Lasfar IPP Expansion. The lenders comprised Export Credit Agencies (JBIC and NEXI of Japan and KEXIM of South Korea) and the Mandated Lead Arrangers (BNPP, Standard Chartered, Société Générale and Banque Centrale Populaire of Morocco). The Sponsor is the Abu Dhabi National Energy Company PJSC ("TAQA").
Allen & Overy has advised International Finance Corporation (IFC) as co-lead Negotiator, Hedging Bank and Arranger for the OPEC Fund for International Development and the Canada Climate Change Program; and Nederlandse Financierings-Maatschappij voor Ontwikkelingslanden N.V.