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MOSCOW, May 5 (RIA Novosti) - MTS, Russia"s...

MOSCOW, May 5 (RIA Novosti) - MTS, Russia"s largest mobile phone operator, has agreed with a group of foreign banks to reschedule its $630 million syndicated loan until 2012, a source in banking quarters said on Tuesday. MTS, which provides services to over 93 million subscribers in Russia alone, raised a syndicated loan facility worth a total of $1.33 billion in April 2006. The loan facility was granted in two tranches, $630 million and $730 million, for three and five years, respectively. The loan facility was arranged by The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd., Bayerische Landesbank, HSBC Bank plc, ING Bank N.V., Raiffeisen Zentralbank Oesterreich AG and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation Europe Limited. Later, some other major foreign banks joined the loan syndicate as its underwriters and managers. MTS channeled the loan proceeds into the refinancing of its liabilities, and also for general corporate needs, including the acquisition of companies. According to the source, the reschedule agreement with the banks is expected to be signed next week. The first tranche will have to be repaid at an annual interest rate of LIBOR plus 6.5% compared with the original rate of LIBOR plus 0.8%. On top of that, the mobile operator will have to pay a fee of 2.5% per annum to the consortium of banks. A company spokeswoman said that MTS, like any other company, was interested in the current economic conditions in prolonging the loan repayment as much as possible at a maximally advantageous rate. MTS posted a US GAAP net income of $1.93 billion and revenues of $10.25 billion in 2008.


Municipal services in Moscow cleared 425,000...

Municipal services in Moscow cleared 425,000 cubic meters of snow from city streets in one day as the Russian capital struggles through its snowiest February for 40 years.


Russia"s Central Elections Commission has...

Russia"s Central Elections Commission has proposed that preliminary voting, where those who cannot vote on election day cast their ballots early, be abolished at all levels, a CEC official said Tuesday.

Real Estate

Tom Balmforth, Russia Profile

of the nineteenth century, then the Afghanistan air transit is a very strong card which we can play in very different games. Therefore I think it would be foolish for Russia just to stop this transit at the very beginning,” said Golts.

Realpolitik aside, Lozansky said there was tangible evidence of better U.S.-Russian relations, as both sides have made concessions. For its part, Russia has signaled it is ready to do more in Afghanistan, such as training, and the United States has stopped lobbying against the North and South Stream gas pipelines, both of which have a positive impact on relations, Lozansky said. “So far, I would give the reset a C, maybe a C-plus. But we can do more – we need to expand cooperation from the areas of anti-terrorism and nuclear non-proliferation,” he said.

This comment first appeared on RussiaProfile.org



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