Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Something big brewing with American Seafoods?

Deckboss advised you a couple of weeks ago about a possible divorce involving American Seafoods and one of its main owners, Coastal Villages Region Fund.

Now, apparently, Seattle-based American, operator of the largest fleet of Bering Sea pollock factory trawlers, is mounting a major refinancing.

A friend today passed along the following item from some sort of subscriber-based financial news service.

It would take, like, a Goldman Sachs trader to fully understand this thing, but it seems clear this is a big and possibly transformative deal for American.

American Seafoods preps bond deal for refinancing effort

American Seafoods this morning unveiled a $400 million, two-part bond deal that is part of a broader refinancing effort. The deal includes $275 million of six-year (non-call three) subordinated notes issued by American Seafoods Group and $125 million of senior notes with warrants from ASG Consolidated and ASG Finance, according to sources.

Bank of America and Wells Fargo are joint bookrunners on the deal. The notes are being issued under Rule 144A for life.

The units consist of seven-year (non-call three) senior notes and warrants expiring in 2018 to purchase 125,000 common shares representing about a 15% indirect ownership of ASG Consolidated, according to sources. The senior notes are conditionally PIK and the first two interest payments will be paid in kind. The first call on notes is at par plus 75% of the coupon.

The subordinated notes are rated B/B3, with a stable outlook on both sides. S&P also gave these notes a 4 recovery rating, which indicates expectations for average (30-50%) recovery in the event of a payment default. The PIK notes are not rated.

Proceeds from the deal will be used to repay debt. The bond deal accompanies a loan package that includes a $85 million, five-year revolving credit, priced at L+400, and a $390 million, five-year term loan, priced at L+400 with a 1.5% LIBOR floor, offered at 99. Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Wells Fargo and DNB Nordbanken are arranging the loan.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

You write that you talked to someone that said "It would take, like, a Goldman Sachs trader to fully understand this thing..." Hilarious!!! So which side set up the deal and then bet that it would fail? Gordon Gekko and Gordon Gekko wannabes in this industry...BE GONE!!!

Anonymous said...

I don't know finance, and it looks complicated...but it's really just another move by the owner(s) to squeeze as much cash as possible out of this company. They've done it many times before, and it's made this company into a house of cards waiting to fail. Good on CVRF for walking away, hopefully they don't have to sell it short just to get out.