Washington D.C, August 28, 2003
—By participating alongside a wide array of institutional investors in Argentina, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private sector developing arm of the World Bank Group, has supported an oversubscribed $20 million debt securities offering in Argentina by
Exportadores II
, a financial trust organized by three leading local banks: Banco Rio de La Plata S.A, BBVA Banco Frances S.A. and HSBC Bank Argentina S.A.
Exportadores II
securitized pre-shipment export loans to four leading Argentine exporters – Molinos Rio de la Plata S.A., Pecom Agra S.A., Petroquimica Rio Tercero S.A. and Vitopel S.A. – and made $20 million of 270-day funding to these companies. This structured finance transaction represents the second public securities offering undertaken through the
Exportadores
Program arranged by these three banks, which provides pre-shipment export financing to Argentine companies.
Over-subscription of this public securities offering resulted from strong investor interest shown in the transaction’s innovative structure.
Exportadores
II also marks IFC's first investment in Argentina’s domestic financial markets, since the onset of the country's economic crisis in late 2001.
Bernard Pasquier, IFC’s Director for Latin America and the Caribbean, observed: "IFC’s participation in the transaction supports efforts by these three leading Argentine banks to expand the
Exportadores
Program, both in terms of size and tenor of financings, thereby making it more widely available for Argentine exporters. It represents an ideal way for IFC to help channel funding to a widening circle of Argentine companies, while also promoting further development of an innovative domestic capital markets funding structure that has already proven attractive to local and international investors.”
Representatives from Banco Rio de La Plata, BBVA Banco Frances and HSBC Bank Argentina all expressed their satisfaction with the transaction’s outcome, and noted that they were pleased to have worked together with IFC on an initiative that ultimately supports Argentina’s increasingly competitive export sector.
Hernan Santolalla, Head of Fixed Income at Banco Rio de la Plata, noted: “IFC’s participation in the transaction has been instrumental in helping us to broaden the purchaser client base for these securities beyond the core group of Argentine pension funds, by catalyzing financing from a broad base of institutional investors that did not participate in last year’s debut
Exportadores
Program securitization. As Argentina’s economic fundamentals continue to stabilize, we are confident that a growing number of increasingly diverse investors will make additional credit available to the country’s exporters through this type of securitization structure.”
In the fiscal year 2002, IFC committed $1.5 billion in Latin America and the Caribbean, for 47 projects amounting to $1.1 billion for its own account and $330 million in syndicated loans. This marks a 45 percent increase from last year's commitment of $1.0 billion, reflecting IFC's confidence in the private sector potential of the region
IFC's mission (
www.ifc.org
) is to promote sustainable private sector investment in developing countries, helping to reduce poverty and improve people's lives. IFC finances private sector investments in the developing world, mobilizes capital in the international financial markets, helps clients improve social and environmental sustainability, and provides technical assistance and advice to governments and businesses. From its founding in 1956, IFC has committed more than $34 billion of its own funds and arranged $21 billion in syndications for 2,825 companies in 140 developing countries. IFC's committed portfolio at the end of FY02 was $15.1 billion with an additional $6.5 billion held for participants in loan syndications.
