Afreximbank gets $300m loan for development, trade in Africa

The African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) says it has secured its first-ever China-Taiwan specific syndicated loan with a $300 million facility from the export-import bank of China (China Exim Bank).

Denys Denya, the bank’s executive vice president for finance, administration and banking services, said via a statement on Monday, that the five-year syndicated loan, which closed on September 12, was only opened to investors from China and Taiwan.

“This syndicated facility helps position Afreximbank to strengthen its role in the development of trade between Africa and the rest of the world, in particular China and the rest of the Far East,” Denya said.

“The conclusion of this facility demonstrates Afreximbank’s increasing ability to attract much-needed resources into Africa and to fund trade finance related investments that will have a positive impact on Sino-African trade.”

He said the facility, which had Standard Chartered bank as the sole coordinator, book runner, and mandated lead arranger, was two times oversubscribed with 16 investors and participating banks.

Denya said he facility would help the bank achieve its liability management objective of reducing the cost of funds and diversifying its liability book by geography, investor type and tenor.

It will be recalled that Afreximbank and China Exim Bank recently signed a one billion dollar collaboration agreement to promote and finance the development of industrial parks across Africa.

Besides, on May 17 in London, Afreximbank closed a $750 million bond after achieving an order book of $3.4 billion from 290 investors.

The bond is the largest ever to be achieved by the bank in the international debt capital market.

Afreximbank is the foremost Pan-African multilateral financial institution devoted to financing and promoting intra- and extra-African trade.

The bank was established in October 1993 by African governments, African private and institutional investors, and non-African investors.

Its two basic constitutive documents are the establishment agreement, which gives it the status of an international organisation, and the Charter, which governs its corporate structure and operations.

Since 1994, it has approved more than 41 billion dollars in credit facilities for African businesses, including about 6.2 billion dollars in 2015.

Afreximbank had total assets of 9.4 billion dollars as at April 30 and is rated BBB- (Fitch) and Baa2 (Moody’s).