Linklaters has advised the existing and incoming senior lenders on the structuring and refinancing of €1.4bn of debt facilities for Budapest Airport. The deal involved refinancing the existing 30 banks with both a significantly revised senior facility and entirely new junior debt tranche. The new structure required entirely new and non-standard principles to be agreed between creditors in the light of the restrictions of the Concession-based rights of the airport; agreement between the various stakeholders (Hungarian State, sponsors, senior and junior lenders) as to how the security structure would change in the context of the existing rights granted by the Hungarian State and the Company; and highly engineered reverse-swap arrangements.

The Linklaters team was led by Infrastructure partner Ian Andrews, supported by a large team including Ross Schloeffel on the core financing and En-Min Chua on the swaps. The deal was completed within a relatively short period of five months from first negotiation to closing, which was a great success for all parties concerned given the complexity of the structures required to reflect the new deal and the large number of counterparties.

Csilla Andreko led the team from Kinstellar Budapest as to Hungarian law and in particular on security issues and interaction with the Hungarian state.