Usiminas Taps Japan Banks

Brazil’s Usiminas has raised $550m in a JBIC A/B loan to capitalize its Japan-based steel mill operations. The Japanese development multilateral lent Usiminas $275m while the rest was syndicated to a club of three banks: Mizuho, Sumitomo, and Tokyo Mitsubishi. Usiminas officials decline to comment on the margin of the facilities. Usiminas is also readying a $400m IDB A/B loan, with an 8-year tenor on the B portion priced at Libor plus 75bp, company officials told LatinFinance earlier this year. Sumitomo is leading that transaction, presumed to be targeting Japanese lenders. That kind of margin is unlikely to fly with conventional LatAm lenders in the present environment.