OREANDA-NEWS. March 14, 2011. UC RUSAL (SEHK: 486, EuroNext: RUSAL/RUAL, MICEX: RUALR, RTS: RUAL), the world's largest aluminium producer, announces that it has made debt repayments in the total amount of approximately USD835 million to its international lenders, Russian lenders and Onexim Holdings Limited under the International Override Agreement (IOA).

The debt repayments were made on four separate dates, 16 February, 25 February, 4 March and 10 March 2011. USD305 million of voluntary prepayments had been repaid out of the free operating cash flow and USD530 million using the funds received from the recent successful ruble bond issue. As at 10 March 2011, the total amount repaid to the lenders since the Override date (excluding repayments made under the refinancing of the VEB loan) totaled USD3.4 billion.

Oleg Mukhamedshin, Director of Capital Markets, RUSAL commented: ‘RUSAL is pleased to have made debt repayments under the IOA ahead of schedule. We will continue to look to use new tools to raise capital going forward. In early March, RUSAL issued ruble-denominated bonds in the amount of 15 billion rubles. The issue attracted great interest from investors. Looking ahead, we plan further borrowings on the debt capital markets during the year. This will allow the company to refinance around USD5 billion of debt by the end of 2012, to reduce debt service costs and to improve its debt structure.’