Airtel Africa secures $500m loan to refinance bond

Airtel Africa, a provider of telecommunications and mobile money services, has announced the successful signing of a new $500m loan facility with a group of relationship banks.

The new committed facility consists of a combination of a revolving credit facility and term loans with tenor of up to five years, according to a statement on Wednesday.

The company said the facility would be used to partially refinance the group’s €750m Euro-denominated bond (about $880m) due May 20, 2021.

It said the balance of the bond would be repaid with existing group cash to reduce gross debt and associated interest costs.

Airtel Africa said, “The new loan facility further strengthens the core liquidity of the group. It also has prepayment flexibilities that will allow the group to optimise the efficiency of its capital structure with the free cash flows and cash receipts anticipated over the next 12 months following the recent announcements related to tower sales and mobile money minority investments.

“The banks which participated in the facility include a diverse group of existing global relationship banks, Bank of America, BNP Paribas, Citibank, HSBC, J.P. Morgan, Standard Chartered Bank and two Indian relationship banks, Axis Bank and Kotak Mahindra Bank.”