Scandlines Secures USD 991 Mn Refinancing Deal

Scandlines German-Danish ferry operator Scandlines has completed an EUR 862 million (USD 991.5 million) refinancing comprising of a six-year bank tranche, an 11-year institutional tranche and associated revolving credit and liquidity facilities. The new debt facilities have been structured on a secured infrastructure style basis, are rated BBB by Fitch and are fully yielding. The company said that the lending group is made up of a large number of European and US parties active in the infrastructure space. The refinancing reduces the long term cost of debt and is a further step in the development of Scandlines, with the company in recent years having streamlined the business to concentrate on providing a high frequency connection between Continental Europe and Scandinavia. In 2016, Scandlines transported 7.6 million passengers, 1.8 million cars and 0.6 million freight units generating total EBITDA of EUR 180 million. The company operates eight ferries on two short-distance ferry routes between Germany and Denmark with high frequency and large capacity.