Search results for

Issuer: Private bank Maturity date: July 30, 2004

Lead arranger UBS Warburg held a bank meeting on Wednesday for the $435m facility backing the buy-out of Swedish office supplies manufacturer Esselte by US sponsor JW Childs Equity Partners. Banks have been offered three levels of participation: senior lead manager for a ticket of $30m paying 95bp flat; lead manager taking $20m for a fee of 80bp flat; and manager committing $10m for a fee of 65bp flat.

A group of around five private equity sponsors circling the vitamins and fine chemicals division of pharmaceutical company Roche have gone through to the second round of bidding. In an announcement released by Roche on Wednesday, the company said that the divestment timetable was on schedule. The company did not release the names of the bidders through to the second round.

First Commercial Bank, Hua Nan Commercial Bank and ICBC have been mandated for a NT$2bn five year term loan for Ritek Corp. Banks will receive a margin of 150bp over the primary CP fixing rate and a commitment fee of 10bp.

Source: Dealogic MTNWare

The French government settled much of the speculation surrounding the highly valuable mandates for the privatisations of Gaz de France and Electricité de France at the end of last week. Crédit Lyonnais and Morgan Stanley have been appointed by the Trésor to advise on the partial sale of Electricité de France. The company is then expected to appoint another bank to the syndicate for the deal. BNP Paribas, which has worked with the company in the past, has been linked with the deal, but this was dismissed by the bank a pure speculation.

In another week almost entirely bereft of new issue business, swap spreads in the two main markets were driven by the sharp movement in underlying government bond markets more than any other factor. Although Treasuries and Bunds rallied in the wake of this week's decision by the FOMC to leave interest rates unchanged, they gave back gains over the second half of the week amid considerable yield curve flattening.

Turkey's financial institutions are racing to get favourable terms and deals launched before the Turkish general elections on November 3. In the last week two of Turkey's leading financial institutions have returned to the loan market in the hope of securing refinancings on better terms.

The $80m 364 day bullet term loan for Export Credit Bank of Turkey (Turk Eximbank) is progressing smoothly in syndication with four banks already in. Commitments are due by August 26. Mandated arrangers are ABN Amro (bookrunner), Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi (bookrunner), BayernLB (facility agent), Commerzbank, Crédit Lyonnais, HVB Group (documentation), Natexis Banques Populaires and WestLB (bookrunner). The deal carries a margin of 135bp over Libor.

Swiss banking giants UBS and Credit Suisse reported their interim results this week, and the contrast between the two could not be starker. UBS reported net profits of Sfr1.3bn for the second quarter - 4% down on the same quarter last year and 2% down in the first quarter, but well above consensus forecasts. Credit Suisse also surprised.

The Financial Supervisory Service, South Korea's securities regulator, has given UBS Warburg a "severe disciplinary warning" and Merrill Lynch a "disciplinary warning" following an investigation into the early disclosure of research. A disciplinary warning is one step below a severe disciplinary warning. The measures will become official following Financial Supervisory Commission approval today (Friday).