RE: Today30 May 2020 23:19
2019 the Group added and refinanced £106 million of debt funding. In June, the Group
refinanced a proportion of the £101.5 million retail-eligible bond maturing 2020, with
£57.4 million of the existing bonds being exchanged, and £20.7 million of new bonds issued
for cash, to create a new £78.1 million 7.75% bond maturing 2023. The remaining
£44.1 million bonds not exchanged will stay in place until May 2020. In addition, the Group
added £28 million of new bank funding in 2019.
The Group’s debt funding position is summarised in the table below. At December 2019, the
Group had total debt facilities of £862 million (£542 million bonds and £320 million bank
facilities) and borrowings of £679 million, with headroom on undrawn facilities of £182 million.
The Group continued to extend debt facilities during 2019, and now has £322 million of facilities
extending beyond the Eurobond maturity in 2021. In the final quarter of 2019, the Group repaid
£14 million of bonds that matured, and bought back £5 million of 2021 Eurobonds at an average
price of 97.3% of par. The Group has two bonds totaling £84 million maturing in May/June
2020, and the £344 million Eurobond matures in April 2021.