Marval O’Farrell Mairal, Bomchil and Beccar Varela Advised in the Granting of a Loan to Aeropuertos Argentina 2000 S.A.
Marval O’Farrell Mairal, Bomchil and Beccar Varela recently acted as counsel in respect of a loan for an amount of ARS 622,188,666.48 granted to Aeropuertos Argentina 2000 S.A. (AA2000) by the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (Argentina) S.A. (ICBC), in accordance with the terms agreed upon in the framework agreement dated April 29, 2020, entered into by and between AA2000, ICBC and certain other banks.
Simultaneously, AA2000 entered into two non-deliverable forward agreements with ICBC, with the purpose of hedging its foreign currency payment obligations under the principal amortization payments due in August and November 2020 and payable by the Company to ICBC under an onshore credit facility entered into by and between AA2000, ICBC, Banco de Galicia y Buenos Aires S.A.U. and Banco Santander Río S.A.
The new loan granted by ICBC will be secured by the same collateral as the onshore credit facility (i.e. the assignment in trust of the freight charges collected by AA2000 through Terminal de Cargas Argentina, a business unit of AA2000), for the purposes of which an amendment to the existing collateral trust agreement was instrumented.
AA2000 is the biggest airport concessionaire in Argentina since 1998 and it has the right, under a Concession Agreement entered into with the Argentine Government, to use, operate and manage 35 of the 54 airports in the Argentine airport system, including the two most transited airports in Argentina.
Marval O’Farrell Mairal acted as counsel to ICBC, Bomchil acted as counsel to AA2000 and, lastly, Beccar Varela acted as counsel to the Branch of Citibank, N.A. established in the Republic of Argentina, in its role as trustee.
It should be noted that Marval O’Farrell Mairal, Bomchil and Beccar have acted as counsel to such clients in the past in the issuance of AA2000’s notes in 2017, the granting of certain credit facilities to AA2000 in 2019 and a framework agreement for their refinancing. Moreover, Marval O’Farrell Mairal and Bomchil acted as special Argentine counsel in the Initial Public Offering of the shares of Corporación America Airports S.A., the parent company of AA2000.
Participating counsel:
Argentina:
Marval O’Farrell Mairal acted as counsel to ICBC, through a team led by partner Roberto E. Silva, assisted by associate Agustín López Roualdès.
Bomchil acted as counsel to AA2000, through a team led by partners Patricio Martin and María Victoria Funes, assisted by associate Facundo José Nazur.
Beccar Varela acted as counsel to the Branch of Citibank N.A., established in the Republic of Argentina, through a team led by partner Daniel Levi, assisted by senior associate Felipe Videla.
In-house counsel:
AA2000: Andrés Zenarruza and Candela López Linetti acted as in-house counsel of AA2000 for the transaction.
ICBC: Matías Filippo and Tomás Koch acted as in-house counsel of ICBC for the transaction.