Davis Polk is advising Credit Suisse Securities (Europe) Limited as sole sponsor and joint financial adviser to Imperial Tobacco Group PLC on its $7.1 billion acquisition of U.S. cigarette brands Winston, Maverick, Kool, Salem and U.S. and international e-cigarette blu, plus other assets, from Reynolds American Inc. as part of its $27.4 billion acquisition of Lorillard Inc. A circular seeking shareholder approval of the transaction was published by Imperial Tobacco on December 15, 2014.

Clifford Chance has advised the leading banks on the signing of commitment documentation to refinance Stabilus S.A.'s 7.75 per cent senior secured notes due 2018 and its EUR 25,000,000 revolving credit facility.

Stabilus S.A. designs, manufactures and distributes spring systems for the automotive industry, furniture applications and open-close systems and despite its listing on the Frankfurt stock exchange earlier this year, remains majority owned by Triton.

Shearman & Sterling assisted Ardian Private Debt as arranger and several funds managed or advised by Ardian Private Debt as subscribers on the €95 million law unitranche financing of the acquisition of the IMV Technologies group by Qualium Investissement from Pragma, which constitutes the third LBO of IMV Technologies.

De Brauw has assisted ING Bank, Rabobank and ABN AMRO as lenders on reaching new estate credit agreements for the bankrupt estate of DSB Bank.

Credit agreements have been amended and restated in order to facilitate a “super interim distribution” to the ordinary creditors of DSB Bank, amounting to 35% of their claims. The commitment has been increased from EUR 1 billion to EUR 1.4 billion.

Jan Marten van Dijk acted as lead partner.

Slaughter and May advised the Kuwait Foreign Petroleum Exploration Company k.s.c., a wholly owned subsidiary of the Kuwait Petroleum Corporation, in relation to its new US$1 billion credit facility. The facility is for general corporate purposes and will support KUFPEC’s international expansion plans.

HSBC Bank Middle East Limited, J.P. Morgan Limited, National Bank of Kuwait S.A.K.P., The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, Ltd. and The Royal Bank of Scotland plc acted as initial mandated lead arrangers with National Bank of Kuwait S.A.K.P. as agent.

The Volati-group has entered into a credit facilities agreement with Nordea Bank AB (publ). The credit facilities will be used partly towards refinancing the Volati-group’s existing loans and partly towards general corporate purposes. Security has been granted over some of the group’s assets to secure the obligations under the credit facilities agreement.

The restructuring comprises the whole group.

Simpson Thacher represented certain Blackstone investment funds (“Blackstone”) in connection with the acquisition of a majority stake in Alliance Automotive Group S.A.S. (“AAG”), which closed on December 1, 2014.  AAG is a leading supplier of auto spare parts and related technical knowhow in France and the United Kingdom, operating under the brands Groupauto, Partners Gef'Auto, Précisium and TPA.

Clifford Chance has advised J.P. Morgan on the takeover offer of Deutsche Annington Immobilien SE to GAGFAH S.A. The Clifford Chance team was led by partner Dr. Marc Benzler (Banking & Capital Markets) and comprised partner Dr. Felix Mühlhäuser and counsel Olaf Mertgen (both Tax), senior associates Dr. Stefan Ueding, Dr. Kai Krieger and Gregory Chartier (all Banking & Capital Markets), partners Dr. André Schwanna, Dr. Arndt Stengel and senior associate Dr.

Ashurst advised RPC Group plc, the UK FTSE-250 plastic packaging manufacturer, on the amendment and restatement of its revolving credit facility. The existing revolving credit facility was increased from £350 million to £490 million for the purpose of funding part of the consideration for the acquisition of Promens Group AS, a leading European manufacturer of rigid plastic products, for €386 million.

The Ashurst banking team comprised lawyers from the firm's London, Paris, Munich, Brussels, New York and Hong Kong office.

Watson, Farley & Williams (“WFW”) has advised Norddeutsche Landesbank Girozentrale (“NORD/LB”) on the acquisition financing for the purchase of a portfolio company by Caldec Holding GmbH (“Caldec”).

The WFW team provided comprehensive advice to NORD/LB on the transaction financing, which closed on 19 November.

Caldec is a holding company owned by private investors that specialises in long-term investments in profitable mid-sized German businesses. Caldec actively supports the management of its portfolio companies to help them grow into a position of market leadership.