Cairo – Mubasher: Telecom Egypt has signed a new $500 million medium-term syndicated loan deal in order to strengthen its capital expenditure and refinance existing short-term facilities.
First Abu Dhabi Bank (FAB) and Mashreq Bank acted as joint coordinators, underwriters, bookrunners, and initial mandated lead arrangers of the loan, similar to the medium-term syndicated loan secured in October 2018, the telecom operator said in a bourse disclosure on Sunday.
FAB also acted as the facility agent for the transaction and Mashreq was the designated account bank and the documentation agent, while Ahli United Bank was an initial mandated lead arranger.
The mandated lead arrangers included Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank, National Bank of Kuwait, Arab Banking Corporation, Al Ahli Bank of Kuwait, Arab Bank PLC - Bahrain, and Europe Arab Bank. Moreover, the Bank of Jordan was a lead arranger, while Attijariwafa Bank acted as an arranger of the facility.
The loan, which was oversubscribed by 2.7 times, will help the company convert its "short-term USD overdrafts into longer-term loans to enable the company to repay instalments in line with its cash flow generation," Managing Director and CEO of Telecom Egypt, Adel Hamed, said.
"We are confident that this facility, along with our growing organic performance and certainty on dividends from associates will translate into a greater cash flow flexibility for the company," Hamed noted.
