YPF makes Argentina’s largest-ever bond offering
Tuesday, 15 April 2014 (1 hour ago) by Thomas Muskett-Ford
Estudio O’Farrell Abogados in Buenos Aires and Chadbourne & Parke LLP in New York have helped Argentina’s state-owned energy company YPF make the largest corporate bond offering in Argentine history, worth US$1 billion.
YPF in Times Square
Credit: YPF http://goo.gl/Lf2c2Z
The transaction, which closed on 1 April, is worth double YPF’s last issuance in December and comes less than a year after the company’s first post-nationalisation offering in September 2013. Investor demand for the 10-year, 8.75 per cent bonds was high with YPF reporting five times oversubscription.
Tanoira Cassagne Abogados in Buenos Aires and the New York and Sao Paulo offices of Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy LLP helped HSBC Securities (USA), Itaú USA Securities and Morgan Stanley place the bonds internationally and Banco Itaú Argentina and HSBC Bank Argentina place them locally.Estudio O’Farrell, Chadbourne and Milbank are all familiar counsel from YPF’s last international issuance in December 2013.Accompanying the 1 April bond offering, but administered in a separation transaction, was a note exchange carried out by YPF and driven through with help from Estudio O’Farrell and Chadbourne. This transaction saw the energy company swap US$85 million of its outstanding 10 per cent medium-term notes due 2028 for 8.875 per cent senior notes due 2018. YPF reported an 85 per cent acceptance rate among noteholders solicited.Jones Walker LLP in New Orleans counselled the exchange agent. The two transactions are framed by a recent settlement between the Argentine government and the company’s former owner, Repsol, and come as YPF steps up investment in one of the world’s largest shale deposits.
Counsel to YPF in the bond offering and bond exchange
In-house counsel – Fernando Gómez Zanou and Lorena Sánchez
Estudio O’Farrell Abogados
Partner Uriel O’Farrell and associates Nicoás Fernández Madero, Sebastián Luegmayer* and Catalina Beccar Varela* in Buenos Aires
Chadbourne & Parke LLP
Partner Talbert Navia and associates Coleman Miller and Patricia Brocos in New York
* Lawyers only involved in bond offering
Counsel to initial purchasers and local placement agent in the bond offering
Tanoira Cassagne Abogados
Partner Alexia Rosenthal and associates Rocío Carrica, Joaquín Villegas and Martín Colombres in Buenos Aires
Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy LLP
Partner Carlos Albarracín and associates Pablo Echeverri and Juan Turner in New York and partner Tobías Stirnberg and associate Felipe Camara in Sao Paulo
Counsel to the exchange agent in the bond exchange
Jones Walker LLP
Partners Jack Shannon and Wish Ziegler in New Orleans
