Brazil Sugar Investor Teams up with Merrill

Clean Energy Brazil, an investment company focused on sugar cane an ethanol in Brazil has tapped Merrill Lynch to advise it on fundraising and strategic growth decisions, it says. The bank will help Clean Energy decide which acquisitions and greenfield projects to pursue, as well as evaluate fundraising options, CEO and joint owner Marcelo Junqueira tells LatinFinance. “The idea was to use a bank with the profile to target potential investors with an appetite for sugar and ethanol,” he says, noting that it picked Merrill before its sale to Bank of America and expects the long-term partnership to be fruitful. He declines to indicate what the company’s capital targets might be. “Raising capital is not a short-term activity. We’ll develop a plan to come to the market when the market recovers,” he explains.