Six months since its last tapped the debt markets, DTH provider DirecTV is back with a US$2bn three tranche senior unsecured bond offering.
The satellite broadcaster said that proceeds from the financing are to be used for general corporate purposes,…
Six months since its last tapped the debt markets, DTH provider DirecTV is back with a US$2bn three tranche senior unsecured bond offering.
The satellite broadcaster said that proceeds from the financing are to be used for general corporate purposes, including the likely repayment of all of the US$1.22bn outstanding borrowings under the Term Loan A and B portions of its senior secured credit facility.
The new facility, which is being issued via its subsidiary DirecTV Holdings, comprises a US$750m 5.5-year note, a US$1bn 10.5-year note and a US$1.25bn 30-year note. The 5.5-year note carries a coupon of 3.125% and priced at 99.935% of par to yield 3.138%. The 10.5-year note pays a coupon of 4.6% and priced at 99.934 to yield 4.608%, while the 30-year note pays a coupon of 6% and priced at 98.659 to yield 6.098%.
The notes, which are rated Baa2 by Moody’s, rank pari passu with the company’s existing senior unsecured notes and interest is to be paid semi-annually in August and February. The settlement date for the offering is August 17.
Joint bookrunning managers are Citigroup, JP Morgan, Credit Suisse and Goldman Sachs, while co-managers are Banc of America, Barclays Capital, Mitsubishi UJF, Morgan Stanley, UBS, Credit Agricole (USA), HSBC, ING, Lloyds TSB, Mizuho, RBS and US Bancorp Investments.
The transaction’s structure echoes the US$3bn three tranche senior unsecured bond offering that DirecTV raised back in March 2010, although the company has secured marginally better terms for this latest issue. That financing was split between a 5-year note paying 3.55%, a 10-year note paying 5.2% and a 30-year note paying 6.35%. Proceeds from that offering were used to repay the outstanding US$978m of its Term Loan C portion of its senior secured credit facility.
Inks Google Ad deal
DirecTV has signed a strategic partnership with internet giant Google in which the latter will become the sales representative for a broad selection of advertising inventory on several cable networks carried by the broadcaster.
Google will now offer its Google TV Ads system to a number of network channels including Bloomberg, Fox Business, Fit, Sleuth and Chiller. Google TV Ads is an online marketplace that enables any advertiser to buy national television advertising. The advertiser can then measure its performance as Google signed a deal with Nielsen to provide audience data.
The service was initially rolled out via a number of US cable channels, such as Hallmark and History Channel, but truly gained scale when Google signed a deal with DirecTV’s DTH rival Dish Network around two years ago. The partnership with both satellite broadcasters means that Google has access to approximately 30 million satellite households.
