UPDATE - Talanx coordinates financing for GIP's Borkum stake buy

Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP) has used EUR 832 million (USD 707m) of senior bond financing as part of its now finalised purchase of a 50% stake in the 450-MW Borkum Riffgrund 2 offshore wind project in German waters.

German insurance group Talanx AG (ETR:TLX) has acted as the lead manager to a group of institutional investors to coordinate the financing, it said today, after Ørsted A/S (CPH:ORSTED) announced it has completed the sale of its 50% stake in the project to GIP. The acquisition price amounts to EUR 1.17 billion. It excludes payments under a contract for the delivery of engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) services.

Among the participating institutional investors are DekaBank, Edmond de Rothschild AM's BRIDGE platform, La Banque Postale Asset Management, NN Investment Partners and Wiener Staedtische Versicherung.

This is the second successful large-scale transaction under the guidance and leadership of Talanx, it said, noting that the first involved the financing of the Gode Wind 1 offshore wind farm in 2015.

"We expect new investments in infrastructure transactions to amount to EUR 300 million in equity and debt in 2018. Overall, we consider EUR five billion of investments in infrastructure achievable," said Immo Querner, CFO of Talanx.

The Borkum Riffgrund 2 wind farm is being constructed about 54 km off the Lower Saxony coast, near the 312-MW Borkum Riffgrund 1 complex that has been operational since 2015. It will use 56 units of MHI Vestas’ V164-8.0 MW turbines, expected to be commissioned in 2019.

(EUR 1.0 = USD 1.177)

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