SteelNews.com Article
Magazine Names MMK-Atakas Finan?ing “The Deal of the Year”
Mar. 12, 2010 MMK-Atakas project financing was selected by Trade Finance magazine as “The Deal of the Year.” Trade Finance is a specialist publication of the Euromoney Institutional Investor group.
“Despite all the problems in the commodity markets and particularly the ferrous sector through 2009, Russian company OJSC MMK put together a ground-breaking deal to secure financing for the MMK-Atakas flat steel making plant in Turkey. The transaction is a worthy winner of a Trade Finance magazine Deal of the Year award for 2009,” said the magazine’s Managing Editor, Jonathan Bell.
MMK-Atakas, a Turkish company jointly owned by MMK (50%, one share) and Atakas Group (50%, one share), was established for developing, engineering, constructing, commissioning, and operating an integrated flat steel making complex at two sites in Iskenderun (Southern Turkey) and Kocaeli (Western Turkey).
Begun in October 2007, the project is expected to be completed in 2010. As a first phase, the steel service center in Iskenderun was completed by the end of 2008. The second phase includes the launching of downstream production lines; and with the completion of the electric arc furnace and related facilities, the third phase will be achieved.
Designed for an annual capacity of 2.3 million tonnes of flat steel production, the project should have a competitive advantage in the global flat steel market, according to MMK-Atakas, due to its ability to directly meet the growing Turkish and Middle East market demand.
On December 29, 2008, OJSC MMK and a consortium of international banks including ABN AMRO Bank N.V. and ING Bank N.V. signed a EUR 416.5 million, 10-year loan with cover offered by EULER HERMES Kreditversicherungs-AG (Germany).
The OJSC Magnitogorsk Iron and Steel Works (MMK), among the world's largest steel producers and one of the leaders of Russia's steel industry, is a large steel-producing complex encompassing the entire production chain, from preparation of iron ore to downstream processing of rolled steel. MMK turns out a broad range of steel products with a predominant share of value-added goods. In 2009, the company produced 9.6 million tonnes of crude steel and 8.8 million tonnes of commercial products. MMK Group revenues in 2008 stood at USD 10.55 billion.