May 06, 2022
New York – Paul Hastings LLP, a premier global finance firm, is pleased to announce that the firm advised on two award-winning deals at Latin Lawyer’s 16th annual Deal of the Year Awards.
Project finance: energy and natural resources:
Panamanian gas-fired power project secures finance
Paul Hastings represented Natixis and SMBC as coordinated lead arrangers, and other lenders (which involved a syndicate of twelve banks - Bank of China, ICBC, Intesa Sanpaolo, Sabadell, Scotiabank, and Societe Generale joined the transaction, as well as some local lenders including Banco Aliado, Banco Nacional, Caja de Ahorro, and Mega ICBC Bank) in the US$740 million senior financing of an approximately 670 megawatt combined cycle gas-to-power project that involved the development and construction of a natural gas-fired power plant, together with all interconnections and certain associated infrastructure, including two transmission lines, and involved diligence on and coordination with a separately funded expansion of AES’s LNG receiving terminal and natural gas pipeline to power station, on Telfers Island, Panama, with AES Panama and InterEnergy as Sponsors. The Project has three 20-year PPAs with Panamanian distribution companies Distco’s and an LNG fuel supply agreement with Total. The project adds significant baseload generation to Panama’s generation sector.
This financing closed simultaneously with the GIP HoldCo financing, on which our Paul Hastings team also worked, bringing over $1 billion in capital funding to the Panama’s energy sector. These deals represent a transformative step forward for Panamanian energy stability, and were previously honored at the 2021 IJGlobal Awards for Power Deal of the Year.
The Paul Hastings team included Robert Kartheiser, Maria Leonor Tobia, Louise Farias, Bruna Rey, Anna Barbosa, Eduardo Morande, Juan Martin Estrada, Joyce Xu, and Matthew Smith.
Restructuring:
Avianca emerges from Chapter 11 process
Paul Hastings advised an ad hoc group of certain holders (the “2023 noteholders”) of Avianca’s 9.000% senior secured notes due 2023 (the “2023 notes”) in connection with the Chapter 11 cases of Avianca Holdings and certain of its direct and indirect subsidiaries (together, “Avianca”) pending in the U.S. bankruptcy court for the Southern District of New York. In the Chapter 11 cases, Avianca sought and obtained approval of debtor-in-possession financing in the approximate amount of US$2 billion (the “DIP financing”). The DIP financing – inclusive of rollups of existing debt and purchase loan consideration – consists of a US$1.27 billion Tranche A senior loan/bonds – of which a portion was a new series of secured notes issued pursuant to Rule 144A/Regulation S, and a US$722 million Tranche B subordinated loan. It includes approximately US$1.21 billion in new funds.
This debt restructuring was critical for the survival of Avianca, an airline crucial to the economy of Colombia and much of South America.
The Paul Hastings team included Pedro Jimenez, Cathleen McLaughlin, Kristopher Villarreal, Andrew Tenzer, Alex Herman, and Leah Lopez.
These awards follow additional recognition for the firm’s Latin America practice, including:
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