The European collateralized loan obligation market kicked off the new year Friday with the pricing of three deals totaling €1.2 billion (US$1.47 billion).
According to leveraged loan/high-yield market research from JPMorgan, those closing on Friday were a trio of refinancing/reset deals from Blackstone/GSO Debt Funds Management, Investcorp and The Carlyle Group’s CELF Advisors unit.
The quick start to the euro-denominated CLO market is keeping pace with the much larger U.S. market's early issuance level of $2.2 billion in five U.S. CLOs that have priced so far this month. Another European deal in the pipeline is the €413.8 million St. Paul's CLO VIII transaction managed by Intermediate Capital Managers, according to ratings agency presale reports.
Blackstone/GSO is refinancing seven classes of notes in its €358 million Tymon Park CLO issued originally issued in 2015. The triple-A portion of the stack remains €238 million, according to a presale report from Moody’s Investors Service.
In addition to new lower terms on the notes, Blackstone/GSO is increasing the weighted average life of the portfolio by 15 months to 7.15 years. No other modifications are taking place, including no extension to the original reinvestment period that ends this week.
Investcorp’s reset of the €428 million Harvest CLO VIII via Barclays is the second refinancing of the 2014 transaction. The new deal follows the previous refi from January 2017 when the CLO was managed by 3i Group’s debt management business. (3i Group sold its US$11 billion global debt management unit to Investcorp in March 2017.)
CELF Advisors reset the €454 million Carlyle Global Market Strategies Euro CLO 2014-3 deal through Citigroup, including new terms for nine classes of replacement notes. The deal’s weighted average spread between offered coupon rates and liability costs increases to 3.45%, and the weighted average life is extended to 9.26 years, according to a presale report from Moody’s.
The Moody’s-modeled WAL is above the covenant mark of 8.75 years, but accounts for the flexibility Carlyle was granted to exclude some assets from the WAL calculation if the portfolio balance exceeds the reinvestment balance target level.
