EBRD raises 750mn euro loan for VW Russia plant

MOSCOW (Reuters) -- The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development said today it had arranged a loan of 750 million euros ($1.12 billion) to help finance Volkswagen AG's first car factory in Russia.

The EBRD will be the lender of record for the 26.2 billion rouble loan, of which 21 billion roubles has been syndicated to a group of 11 banks under an eight-year facility at a price of 55 basis points over Mosprime, an interbank lending rate.

The development bank will keep 5.2 billion roubles of the loan on its own books, with a term of 10 years.

"The loan is the largest in the EBRD's history and the highly successful syndication was oversubscribed despite tight market conditions," the EBRD said in a statement.

The plant, in Kaluga to the south of Moscow, is being officially opened on Wednesday and becomes the third greenfield auto plant in Russia in which the EBRD has invested in the past six years. It will produce VW and Skoda models.

Lead arrangers on the loan were Calyon, Unicredit and ING, while ABN Amro, Skandinavska Enskilda, Sumitomo Mitsui, Commerzbank and Nordea acted as arrangers. Co-arrangers were DZ Bank, Fortis and Landesbank Baden-Wuerttemburg.