Euromoney Training


Leveraged Finance
for
NIBC

Prof. Ian Giddy,
New York University



About the Session
This 2-day
workshop on leveraged financing techniques will be taught around several major topics employing in-depth group work on case studies, financial analysis and deal documentation. The focus will be on identifying situations that call for highly leveraged finance solutions, and the design and pricing of the high-spread loans and high-yield bonds as well as the equity instruments that support the leverage. Examples of such situations include private equity and leveraged buyouts, financing acquisitions, defensive financial restructuring, recapitalizations, and asset-based techniques such as leveraged leasing. A catalyst for leveraged buyouts is so-called mezzanine finance that falls between senior debt and pure equity.

This workshop explains why and when corporations and financial institutions employ leveraged funding, and in what form. In two information-packed days of instruction and application, we offer an economic analysis of the techniques and their pricing, an insight into when LBOs succeed and when they fail, paydown and exit strategies, methods of cash-flow modelling, and a framework for choosing among alternative leverage and mezzanine techniques. One goal for participants is to develop a checklist of the key criteria in a leveraged finance deal. This will help them to identify the main strengths and risks of each structure or proposed deal.

Methods and Materials

The workshop includes case studies of actual financings and sample documentation. It offers hands-on exercises, and will give participants the opportunity to augment their understanding of deals through group work, presentations and discussions. Participants will be provided with a package of materials useful to the structuring and analysis of specially tailored leveraged financing techniques, including pertinent articles, rating agency reports and sample documentation from actual deals done in North America, Europe and elsewhere.



Background Readings
These articles will help you prepare for the course. 
Leveraged Alchemy


Course Outline


Date
Topics
Resources

Day 1 Leveraged Finance: Debt Restructuring Opportunities
  • The global market for leveraged finance
  • Leverage: the good, the bad and the ugly
    • Performance-driven leveraged finance (Sealed Air)
    • Defensive leveraged finance
    • Deal-driven leveraged finance (ISS)
    • Leverage in ownership transition
  • Identifying corporate debt restructuring opportunities
  • Case study: Spacemasters. The owner of a private company is looking for acquisition finance. Participants estimate the company's debt capacity and the owner's options.
  • Establishing required rates of return: the "Fierce Creatures" method and others
    • Adjusting the costs of debt and equity for leverage
    • Corporate taxation and capital structure
    • Leverage optimization through WACC simulation
  • Case study: Oracle. We compute the effective cost of capital for a company with various degrees of leverage, and consider how leverage fits in with the company's business and financial strategy.
  • Corporate valuation for acquisiitons
  • Valuation in a leveraged finance context, with a changing capital structure, higher costs of debt and high private equity required returns
  • The "VC Method"

Leveraged Finance Analysis

  • Types of acquisitions and how they are financed
  • Sponsor vs trade acquisitions: comparing valuation analysis
  • Leveraged finance as a temporary capital structure: entry, paydown. exit
  • Implementing a leveraged acquisition: senior, mezzanine and equity finance
  • Case study: Madras Appliances. Teams evaluate a variety of creative financing techniques in the context of this challenging acquisition situation.
  • Retail securitisations as an acquisition finance take-out
  • Raising the money: Debt Capacity Analysis
  • How to structure and price the funding
  • Focus: shadow ratings and debt pricing
  • Case Study: Nukem Security Services. A management team hopes to acquire the company's security services division. How much of the purchase cost could be financed with debt?
  • Debt paydown & refinancing
  • High yield bond market refinancing: The case of Hertz
  • Role of mezzanine, sponsor equity, management equity, "envy factor"
  • Exit timing, methods and valuation
  • Case study: Exit for Reykjavik Fleet Leasing
Teamwork
  • Group Exercise: The LBO of ISS. Teams undertake a step-by-step analysis of the Danish company's debt capacity and the LBO financing possibilities.
Presentations
nibc-restructuring
nibc-buyouts

Case Studies
Spacemasters
Oracle
Madras Appliances
Nukem Security
Reykjavik Fleet Leasing
The LBO of ISS
iss_financials.xls

Articles
Introduction to Leveraged Finance
A Note on LBOs
Debt-to-EBITDA
LBO Legal Checklist
 
Spreadsheets
wacc.xls
spacemasters.xls
oracle.xls
Corporate Finance and Debt Capacity Tables
lbocapacity2.xls
financing_iss
lbo_exit.xls


Day 2 

Mornng Feedback
  • The LBO of ISS. We discuss the teams' results and issues arising from this deal. We also explore the legal structure.

Leveraged Financing Techniques: Mezzanine and More

  • Survey of leveraged finance techniques, and when it makes sense to use them
  • Finding the optimal financing mix: debt, equity or mezzanine?
  • The players and the market today: LBO funds, private equity houses, advisory firms and others
  • Syndicated acquisition lending
  • Assets versus cash flows as support for leverage
  • Sale leaseback and other asset-based funding
  • Second lien financing
  • Case study: CUSA Busways. How second-lien lending contributed to the leveraged buy-out of a bus company.
  • Second lien termsheet analysis
  • Structuring the relationship between the partners
  • Pay-in-kind (PIK) notes
  • Case study: Sealy PIK
  • Holdco PIKs
  • Case study: Jefferson Smurfit. Participants identify the factors that determine the rating of this "Holdco PIK"
  • Mezzanine and more
    • Senior sub debt
    • Warrant notes
    • Case study: Woodstream. Who gets the warrants, and what are they worth? What is the effective cost of financing to the company?
    • Convertible notes and preferred stock
  • Performance-linked participation debt: an alternative form of mezzanine
  • Case study: Suriname Hydropower. Exit without an exit event?
  • Subordinated vendor financing
  • Equity, including hybrids in acquisition finance (Lottomatica)

Leveraged Recapitalizations and Roll-Ups

  • Proactive leverage: roll-ups and recaps
  • Impact of high leverage on business efficiency and shareholder risk
  • Leveraged recaps with share buybacks or special dividends to enhance shareholder value
  • Case study: Sealed Air Corporation. We learn how a company with stable and growing free cash flows can exploit its debt capacity, and discuss the risks it takes in doing so. 
  • Leveraged recaps for ownership transition or cash-out
  • Case study: Ahlsell's Leveraged Recap. We look at the tiering of funding instruments in this Swedish leveraged dividend recapitalization.
  • "Stapled-on finance"
  • Leveraged defensive recaps
  • Case study: Houston Exploration. Do you agree with all the recommendations of Jana Partners?
  • Leveraged roll-ups: The funeral story; Reclamation Group.
Summary and Conclusions


Presentations
nibc-techniques
nibc-recaps

Case Studies
CUSA Busways
Second lien facility
Sealy PIK
Woodstream Mezz
Jefferson Smurfit
Woodstream
Woodstream Termsheet
Suriname Hydro
Lottomatica
Sealed Air
Ahlsell's Recap
Houston Exploration

Articles
The Value of Loan Covenants
Second Lien Loans
Mezzanine Finance 1
Mezzanine Finance 2
Hybrids
Leveraged Recaps
Leveraged Rollups

Spreadsheets
woodstream.xls
financing_abc.xls



More Resources
  1. Corporate information: finance.google.com, finance.yahoo.com, reuters.com
  2. Corporate Finance and Debt Capacity Tables - Ratios and comparables to estimate normal gearing and valuation
  3. Rating Calculation (xls) - Estimates a rating and cost of debt based on the coverage of debt by an organization.
  4. LBO Valuation (xls) - Analyzes the value of equity in a leverage buyout.
  5. The Leveraged Loan Market
  6. LBO Due Diligence
  7. Sponsors' Role in Leveraged Debt Financing
  8. Leveraged Finance articles
  9. Sample documentation for leveraged loans, leases, etc
  10. ISS Actual Financing
Sources: damodaran.com, Bank of America Business Capital, and others


The Instructor

Ian Giddy, a native of South Africa, has taught finance at NYU, Columbia, Wharton, Chicago and in over forty countries worldwide for the past three decades. He was Director of International Fixed Income Research at Drexel Burnham Lambert from 1986 to 1989. The author of more than fifty articles on international finance, he has served at the International Monetary Fund and the U.S. Treasury and has been a consultant with numerous corporations and financial institutions in the U.S. and abroad. As a banker and consultant he has been involved in the growth of the leveraged and mezzanine markets in the USA, Europe and emerging markets. He is the author or co-author of The International Money Market, The Handbook of International Finance, Cases in International Finance, Global Financial Markets, Asset Securitization in Asia and The Hudson River Watertrail Guide. He and his wife are the founders of Cloudbridge, a nature reserve in Costa Rica.


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