Thursday 25 / April / 2024
Muscat: Majority shareholders of UAE Exchange Centre and Travelex Holdings have announced that they have closed a $890 million term loan financing to support the growth of the two companies.
The majority shareholders in both firms are Centurion Investments, a leading UAE investment firm, and Dr B R Shetty, a well-known entrepreneur and philanthropist. The shareholders reserve the option to increase the size of the total facilities by $75 million, said a company release.
The proceeds are being used to refinance the bridge loan for the acquisition of Travelex by the shareholders completed in January 2015 and to finance the integration project to combine and expand the digital and geographic footprint of Travelex and UAE Exchange.
Travelex and UAE Exchange will continue to operate as two brands, each focused on their specific markets and product offerings, but will extend their reach by offering products through both platforms as well as benefit from the sharing of category expertise.
The shareholders will continue to invest in the growth of both companies by increasing distribution channels, widening product range, entering new markets and building on their scale advantages. Developing digital products will be a strategic focus for the shareholders, with an opportunity to increase the presence and business in developed markets as well as laying the foundation for the combined group as a formidable digital financial institution.
KhaleefaButti Al Muhairi, chairman of Travelex, commented, “We are pleased to have strong support from the international banking community for this financing, which demonstrates the strength and growth potential of both Travelex and UAE Exchange. This transaction will allow us to accelerate the growth of both businesses as two distinct leading brands, while benefitting from synergies arising due to each other’s networks, shared expertise and infrastructure.”
Dr B R Shetty, chairman of the UAE Exchange Group and vice-chairman of the Travelex Group, said, “This is an exciting time for Travelex, the world’s leading independent retail foreign exchange business, and UAE Exchange, the most widely networked remittance institution globally. The combination between the two will give us a strong foundation to grow both businesses through sharing of a number of complementary offerings. We would like to thank our existing banking partners, who assisted us in the acquisition of Travelex and our new banking partners, who joined the facilities.”
Goldman Sachs and Qatar National Bank acted as global coordinators, bookrunners and mandated lead arrangers and Doha Bank acted as coordinator, bookrunner and mandated lead arranger. The other bookrunners and mandated lead arrangers were Barclays Bank, Commercial Bank International and National Bank of Fujairah. Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank and IDBI Bank acted as mandated lead arrangers and Axis Bank as lead arranger.
Travelex is the world’s leading independent retail foreign exchange business, handling $35 billion worth of transactions in 2015. Over the past 38 years, it has built the world’s largest retail network of specialist foreign exchange stores and has developed into a trusted and widely recognised brand in foreign exchange.
UAE Exchange, which has been operating for 35 years, is the most widely networked remittance institution globally, with close to 800 branches spread across 31 countries in five continents. UAE Exchange handled $27.56 billion worth of transactions in 2015 with much of the remittances to the Asian corridor and has nearly 6 per cent share in the business to developing countries. The World Bank estimates that in 2014, global remittances were at $583 billion, of which $435 billion was to developing countries.
