Overview:
- Scotiabank de Costa Rica received a $125 million credit facility from a syndicate of banks including Wells Fargo and Banco Latinoamericano.
- “This transaction was a syndicated credit agreement that was divided into two tranches, each trench had different conditions and interest rates,” said Consortium Legal associate Susana Raventós Chaves who worked on the transaction.
- According to Raventós there were about 8-10 lenders total. Lenders were based in a range of jurisdictions including the US, Canada, the Dominican Republic, Panama, Taiwan, Germany, Lucia, Trinidad & Tobago, and China.
- “They wanted to offer the potential to participate in this transaction to different kinds of lenders; some of them, we understand, investing for the first time in Costa Rica. Initially Scotiabank was intending to obtain near to $75 million but because of the significant demand from foreign lenders the bank reviewed its requirements and ended up receiving $125 million,” said Randall Barquero León, a partner who led the deal at Consortium.
- The partners stated that this transaction is emblematic of larger trends in the market. “Costa Rica’s economy is growing. Not as much as we would like to, but it is growing and there is demand for financing for medium and small corporations doing business here and also for residential mortgages. This is not an isolated transaction; this is part of what is happening in the economy,” Mario Quesada-Bianchini who also led the team at Consortium said. “We have participated in several transactions in which private banks are obtaining funding from offshore lenders, to continue increasing their market share.”
- Consortium Legal (Randall Barquero, Mario Quesada-Bianchini, Susana Raventós) and Mayer Brown (David Duffee, Jason Bazar) advised the borrower.
- Arias & Muñoz (Daniel Araya,Donato Rivas) and White & Case (Carlos Vianna) advised the lenders.
Rani Mehta - Journalist - Latin America
