OREANDA-NEWS. October 10, 2008. Sberbank (RTS: SBER, MICEX: SBER03) signed a USD1.2bn loan agreement with a syndicate of 15 financial institutions from Europe, North America, and Japan, reported the press-centre of Sberbank.

The Mandated Lead Arrangers and Bookrunners for the loan are ABN AMRO Bank N.V., The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, Ltd., Barclays Capital (the investment banking unit of Barclays Bank PLC), BNP Paribas, Deutsche Bank AG (Deutsche Bank), DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral-Genossenschaftsbank, Frankfurt am Main (DZ BANK), ING Bank N.V., Intesa Sanpaolo Bank Ireland plc (Intesa), J.P. Morgan plc, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation Europe Limited (SMBCE), UniCredit Bank Austria AG and Bayerische Hypo- und Vereinsbank AG acting jointly and severally under the name UniCredit Markets & Investment Banking (“UniCredit”) and WestLB AG, London branch (“WestLB”).

The Lead Arrangers for the loan are Commerzbank Aktiengesellschaft (Commerzbank) and Mizuho Corporate Bank Ltd (Mizuho). Dresdner Kleinwort, an investment banking division of Dresdner Bank AG (Dresdner Kleinwort), acted as Arranger. Barclays Capital was the Co-ordinating Bookrunner.

Under the current adverse international financial market circumstances, this syndicated loan was raised at a record-low rate of LIBOR+0.85% pa as all the members of the syndicate confirmed their pre-crisis commitments to Sberbank. The term of the loan is 3 years with bullet repayment. The syndication was launched in September. The final amount did not change notwithstanding that the loan was oversubscribed. Sberbank will use the loan proceeds for the general corporate purposes.

This syndication was another proof of the lenders’ stability and willingness to continue actively invest in Russia and of Sberbank’s reputation as a key financial institution and first-rate borrower.