Iberdrola has successfully concluded the signing of a new multi-currency syndicated loan amounting to €1.5bn and linked to sustainability criteria, within the group's current financing strategy.
Image: Iberdrola signs a new credit deal for €1.5bn. Photo: Courtesy of Iberdrola, S.A.
Specifically, this is the first financing operation linked to point 7 of the UN Agenda 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): affordable and clean energy.
The company has achieved favourable conditions for this operation, returning to levels prior to the onset of the financial crisis. Specifically, the differential obtained could be up to 23.5 basis points over the Ibor benchmark, compared to 27.5 basis points for the last credit line signed by the company in January 2018. The maturity is five years, with the possibility of extending it by two years, until March 2026.
These advantageous conditions are linked to compliance with two sustainability indicators validated by the independent agency Vigeo Eiris. The first is of a social nature and is related to SDG 7.1, which seeks to guarantee universal access to affordable, reliable and modern energy services. Hence, the loan signed today becomes the company’s first to be linked to the universal access to energy criteria. This operation is therefore in line with the ‘Electricity for All’ programme, through which Iberdrola has set itself the goal of bringing electricity to 16 million people who currently lack it in emerging or developing countries by 2030.
The second indicator is of an environmental nature and is linked to the installation of new renewable power, in line with point 7.2 of the United Nations Agenda 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): to increase substantially the share of renewable energy in the global energy mix.
The participants in this credit are 21 financial institutions, all of them relationship banks of the Iberdrola group of different nationalities that support the company in its operations. The new loan was coordinated by BBVA, which has also been a sustainable co-agent together with BNP Paribas.
The company thus continues to adapt its liquidity to the investments of €34bn planned for the period 2018-2022 and is fulfilling its commitment to maintain adequate liquidity, in accordance with the group’s Strategic Outlook, which sets a liquidity level of between €12bn and €14bn.
Iberdrola, a leader in sustainable financing
With this new credit operation, Iberdrola continues to advance in its socially responsible financing strategy.
Throughout 2018, the company signed the largest sustainable global loan and the first corporate green loan in Latin America.
Furthermore, last year Iberdrola undertook all its public bond issuances in this format, as well as all its hybrid placements, a market that the company inaugurated in Spain in 2016. The group was the world’s largest green issuer at company level in 2016 and 2017.
This commitment to sustainable financing is part of Iberdrola’s commitment to meeting the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the UN Agenda 2030, which the company has integrated into its strategy. In particular, Iberdrola is focusing on objective 7 – affordable and clean energy, and 13 – climate action.
Source: Company Press Release