Search results for

MERRILL Lynch this week successfully sold a 1% stake in the UK family controlled transport group, Stagecoach, in an accelerated marketed offering. This is the first time that the US firm has used this method of placing stock.

* Glaverbel, the Belgian glass maker, has withdrawn plans for a $130m convertible bond due to poor market conditions. The issuer, which has rarely used the equity capital markets was to launch its bonds in the next week, but pulled the transaction as the company felt its share price had fallen to unjustifiably low levels. The group is not alone. Dedicated convertible salesmen in London say that the number of issuers interested in coming to the convertible market has shrunk and that, as share prices remain vulnerable to market volatility, that it is unlikely that this situation will be reversed soon.

* Fannie Mae Rating: Aaa/AAA

6924

Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi has hired Stuart Levett as head of secondary loan sales and trading. Levett joins from Citibank where he was a member of the loan syndication and secondary sales team. He will report to John Reffell, head of syndications at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi.

LEAD arrangers Merrill Lynch, Caixa Geral de Depósitos and Citibank have won the mandate to arrange a $1.3bn debt package backing Portugal Telecom's acquisition of Telebras, Brazil's leading telecom network. The loan, which is the largest credit facility ever for a Portuguese borrower, has a 364 day maturity. For the first six months, the facility carries a margin of 20bp over Libor, and 25bp thereafter. However, if Portugal Telecom's rating drops from A+ to A-, the margin increases by 10bp.

6890

GENERAL syndication of the £2.4bn credit facility for PowerGen Finance is scheduled to close today (Friday), according to arrangers Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs and HSBC. The deal has been an unqualified success and syndication should be a blow-out -- a rarity in today's market.

ROBERT Fleming and Dresdner Kleinwort Benson will next week launch the sale of stock in SanLam, one of South Africa's premier life assurance groups, as part of its demutualisation. Despite the difficult global stockmarkets, investors are reported to be expressing keen interest in this deal.

Denmark ABN Amro, Citibank and Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi have launched general syndication of the $500m facility for Borealis, the Danish petrochemicals company. A bank meeting is scheduled for today (Friday).

MERRILL Lynch and Merita will next week launch the sale of stock in Sonera, the Finnish national telecommunications operator. The authority will meet its bankers this weekend to decide on the structure and size of the deal. "We have two conflicting messages from the market," said one banker in London. "We have seen Swisscom trade like any bull market privatisation and we have seen the French government postpone its offering of France Télécom."