Three JTF awards for HSH Nordbank
Aircraft Debt Deal of the Year - Asia Shipping Debt Deal of the Year - North America Rail Finance Innovator 2007
Hamburg/Kiel, December 7, 2007 - HSH Nordbank has received multiple awards from international specialist periodical Jane’s Transport Finance (JTF). At this year’s Gala Awards Dinner in London’s Merchant Taylors’ Hall, HSH Nordbank’s Transportation Finance team received as many as three of the sought-after awards for its work this year. The Bank was awarded the “Aircraft Debt Deal of the Year – Asia”, the “Shipping Debt Deal of the Year – North America” and the “Rail Finance Innovator 2007”.
“We are pleased that the extremely successful performance of the Bank’s core segments this year has been perceived as such within the industry,” said Peter Rieck, Deputy Chairman of HSH Nordbank. A total of 140 business deals by 27 investment banks were nominated for the 8th Jane’s Transport Finance Awards. This year HSH Nordbank’s Transportation unit has thus received awards from Jane’s Transport Finance for the second time since 2005. That year, the unit received the “Shipping Finance Innovator“ award. “These awards are, not least, an expression of the further increase in HSH Nordbank’s international significance, especially in the aviation and infrastructure segments. We have long ceased to be a mere lender and now also act as advisors, providers of debt and equity capital and asset manager in these core areas of business. We thus cover the entire value chain in transportation and infrastructure finance,” commented Mathis Shinnick, Head of Transportation at HSH Nordbank.
The “Aircraft Debt Deal of the Year – Asia” award was given jointly to HSH Nordbank and KfW IPEX Bank as leaders of the international banking syndicate that finances the expansion of the aircraft fleet of today’s Air India. The volume came to approx. USD 520 million, which was used to buy the first ten aircraft from the Airbus A320 family for Air India. The finance deal did not involve European loan-loss hedges by means of export credit agencies.
HSH Nordbank was given the “Rail Innovator 2007” award together with Babcock & Brown for the first Belgian infrastructure project to be financed as a private-public partnership deal. HSH Nordbank will finance construction of two partially subterranean rail lines, each about three kilometers in length. This will connect Brussels’ main airport to the rail link between Schaerbeek and Mechelen that is currently under construction. The airport will thus be hooked up to the significant Paris-Brussels-Antwerp axis. HSH Nordbank acted as minority investor in the project named “Diabolo“ and as sole arranger of the debt finance. The project has an overall volume of approx. EUR 370 million, which includes EUR 290 million in construction costs. The construction phase is due to be completed by 2012.
HSH Nordbank received the “Shipping Finance Debt Deal of the Year – North America” award as underwriter and mandated lead arranger of a group of international investment banks for a USD 800 million loan to Teekay Tankers, a subsidiary of the US company Teekay Shipping Corporation. The latter recently took over the listed tanker shipping company OMI Corporation together with Danish product tanker shipping company Torm. The takeover had an overall volume of USD 2.2 billion, of which more than a billion dollars was financed by HSH Nordbank.
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