The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the International
Finance Corporation (IFC) today launched their largest syndicated loan
to date in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), a US$ 250 million
loan for Ispat Karmet in Kazakhstan.
The loan is the leading element of a US$ 450
million financing package provided jointly by the EBRD and the IFC to Ispat
Karmet, one of the world’s largest single-site integrated steel plants
with two captive power plants and 15 coal mines. As well as being the largest
commercial enterprise in Kazakhstan, the company is a member of the fastest-growing
steel conglomerate in the world, the LNM Group, which recently announced
its intention to acquire one of the largest US steel companies, Inland
Steel.
The Ispat Karmet financing package is the
first for a major private industrial company in Kazakhstan and the largest
financing ever provided for a privatised enterprise in the country. In
addition to the EBRD and IFC loans, US$ 350 million of the investment package
totalling over US$ 800 million is being funded by Ispat Karmet from internally
generated cash flow.
Led by the EBRD and the IFC, two major multilateral
financial institutions with extensive experience in Central Asia, the syndicated
loan is fully underwritten. Joining the EBRD and the IFC in this transaction
are five major commercial co-arrangers: ABN AMRO, Bayerische Landesbank,
Credit Suisse First Boston, ING Barings and the Royal Bank of Canada Europe
Limited. Their endorsement demonstrates the renewed interest in co-financing
opportunities in the emerging markets of Central Asia.
The IFC fosters economic growth in the developing
world by financing private sector investments, mobilising capital in the
international financial markets, and providing technical assistance and
advice to governments and businesses.
The EBRD was set up in 1991 following the
collapse of communism, to aid the transition from centrally planned to
market economies in central and eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of
Independent States. The EBRD is owned by 60 shareholders: 58 countries,
the European Investment Bank and the European Community, and operates with
ECU 20 billion in capital.
Visit the EBRD’s website at: www. ebrd.com
Visit the IFC’s website at: www.ifc.org
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