Mechel’s $3.5 Billion Refinancing Talks Include Asian Banks
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OAO Mechel, Russia’s most indebted mining company, is including Asian lenders in talks to refinance as much as $3.5 billion of borrowings as customers for its coal in China and other countries in the region increase.
“We’ve started to export more to Asia and want to gain some advantage from this,” Chief Financial Officer Stanislav Ploschenko said in an interview. The Asian talks cover $2.5 billion of debt due in 2014 owed to international lenders including European and U.S. banks, and are due to conclude this year. Mechel targets July completion for an agreement with a Russian bank to refinance about $1 billion due in 2013, he said.