On July 15, 2016, Victoria International Container Terminal (VICT) signed a syndicated loan facility worth AUD 398 million (approximately USD 300 million) with seven leading global financial institutions, namely: Citibank N.A., KFW IPEX-Bank, Standard Chartered Bank as Mandated Lead Arrangers and Bookrunners, Bank of China Limited, DBS Bank Ltd., Investec Bank PLC as Mandated Lead Arrangers, and Cathay United Bank as Lead Arranger.
The facility provides significant financial flexibility with long-dated tenors of 7, 10, and 16 years.
Finnvera, the Finland based export credit agency, also participated in the transaction by providing a guarantee for a portion of the facility.
The newly-secured financing will support the on-going construction and development of VICT at Webb Dock East in the Port of Melbourne, Australia.
Christian R. Gonzalez, VICT Chairman and ICTSI Group’s Senior Vice President and Regional Head - Asia Pacific & MICT, extended his congratulations to the lenders for sharing in the common vision of providing the Melbourne container market with a truly leading edge service that will benefit all port users and stakeholders.
Anders Dommestrup, VICT Chief Executive Officer commented that “VICT is extremely pleased to have signed this project finance facility with internationally renowned banks as this is a testament to the viability of VICT. We remain committed to working with all our partners – the Port of Melbourne, local community, our contractors, and now our lenders – to deliver to Melbourne a world-class and industry leading container terminal”.
“The VICT deal has pushed the project finance envelope in Australia on a number of aspects, and this has made the process quite challenging. Thanks to the collaborative effort put in together with our lending partners, we achieved a final debt structure that positions VICT for both short and long term financial strength,” added ICTSI Corporate Finance Director Manuel V. Pascua.
The alliance of Linklaters and Allens acted as the legal advisor Citicorp with Capital Philippines, Inc. as the financial advisor to VICT.
Construction of the terminal commenced in late 2014, and will be completed in two phases. Phase One will be ready for commercial operations in Q4 2016 and Phase Two will be available in 2017.
With this deal, ICTSI continues its streak of successful funding transactions. In addition to deals done at the corporate level every year since 2010, ICTSI secured a major project finance facility last October 2015 when Contecon Manzanillo S.A. de C.V. signed a USD 260 million loan for its port development and operations in the Port of Manzanillo, Mexico.
The confidence of the banks in both VICT and ICTSI that this transaction demonstrates is a confirmation of both the robustness of the VICT business plan as well as the strong track record of ICTSI in effectively implementing container terminal projects.
Victoria International Container Terminal - One of the most innovative, sustainable, fully automated container terminals in the world. Coming to the Port of Melbourne, final quarter 2016.