UAE incumbent Etisalat is expected to hand its own term sheet to some if not all of the ten banks that have pitched for a debt mandate on the operator’s agreed takeover of Zain “imminently”, TelecomFinance has learned.
That said, the deal has been…
UAE incumbent Etisalat is expected to hand its own term sheet to some if not all of the ten banks that have pitched for a debt mandate on the operator’s agreed takeover of Zain “imminently”, TelecomFinance has learned.
That said, the deal has been progressing slowly and is not expected to conclude until January. After receiving term sheets from each of the ten banks, Etisalat yesterday asked them to sign an NDA before giving them access to its books.
All ten banks are expected to participate in some way, with the seniority of roles the main question.
It has been confirmed that the ten banks are Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi, BNP Paribas, Citigroup, Credit Agricole, HSBC, Societe Generale, Standard Chartered, National Bank of Abu Dhabi, National Bank of Kuwait and RBS.
A source close to the situation confirmed a report in today’s Financial Times that Etisalat is seeking US$12bn, structured as a US$6bn bridging loan and two US$3bn loan tranches – one over three years and one over five years.
Etisalat registered an interest in Zain in September after discussions with one of the Kuwaiti telco’s primary shareholders, the al-Kharafi group. The process has now moved on to the due diligence phase with Etisalat setting a deadline of 15 January for definitive transaction documents to be in place. Earlier this month, the company informed the Abu Dhabi and London stock exchanges that it wanted the facility to issue and list up to US$8bn in debt.
It is thought that lenders are not concerned about legal threats by some of Zain’s smaller shareholders, a possible downgrade of Etisalat by rating agencies or the sovereign crisis currently affecting Europe.
Etisalat declined to comment.
