Linklaters has advised a consortium of banks on the financing of the acquisition of Paysafe Group Plc by Blackstone and CVC. Paysafe is a leading global online payments services company serving more than 125,000 merchants in over 100 countries and this transaction is one of the largest public-to-private takeovers of the year and one of the top 10 largest European LBO's of 2017.
 
Linklaters advised Credit Suisse AG, London Branch, Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC, Jefferies Finance LLC, Morgan Stanley Bank International Limited, BMO Capital Markets Corp. and Deutsche Bank AG, London Branch as arrangers of a $2,090,000,000 first lien facility, a $500,000,000 second lien term facility and a $175,000,000 revolving credit facility, to finance the acquisition of Paysafe Group Plc by Blackstone and CVC. The £2.96 billion public-to-private takeover was implemented by way of an Isle of Man scheme of arrangement, which became effective on 20 December 2017 with the consideration being paid to shareholders and the transaction completing on 3 January 2018.
 
Adam Freeman, Head of Leveraged Finance at Linklaters, says: “This is a very significant deal given it’s one of the largest public-to-private takeovers of the year and one of the top 10 largest European LBO’s of 2017. The debt was syndicated in both, the US and European markets and so the structure and documentation had to be acceptable to investors in both markets. There has been a resurgence of public to private transactions and given recent regulatory reforms this adds to the complexity of deals such as this particularly in relation to syndicating the debt before the acquisition has completed. Linklaters is very well placed to advise on such deals given our market leading M&A and Finance practices. ”
 
The Linklaters team was led by Head of Leveraged Finance Adam Freeman and Banking partners Robert Burt and Ed Aldred and Corporate partner Iain Wagstaff.