Businessman Zoltan Teszari, owner of RCS&RDS telecom operator, has pledged as collateral for a loan (contracted from a syndicate of 14 banks) both the shares he owns, as well as the 78 percent stake in RCS&RDS he owns through Cable Communications Systems N.V.
RCS&RDS, a major player on the domestic telecom market, last month failed to become listed on the London Stock Exchange due to unfavourable international capital market conditions and announced it would secure necessary financing through a syndicated loan worth 500 million euros, arranged by ING and Citi (Citibank London) banks.
According to financial market sources, the loan was oversubscribed. The sources also believe the loan contract is currently delayed by legal objections raised by one of the banks part of the syndicate.
RCS&RDS is in need of more than 200 million euros in order to expand its Romanian mobile telephone network and enter other regional markets.
According to the data available in the Electronic Archive of Pledges, the majority shareholder in RCS&RDS, Cable Communications Systems N.V., and individual shareholders Zoltan Teszari, Virgil Dan and Zoltan Horvath offered as collateral the shares they hold in RCS&RDS for a loan with an unspecified value from 14 banks.
The overall shares offered as a guarantee account for 79.22 percent in the share capital of RCS&RDS. Entrepreneurs who pledge as collateral the shares they hold in companies or real estate assets in order to contract loans are a common occurrence on the market.
According to the data available from the Electronic Archive of Pledges, the banks expected to release loans are, ING (Romania), ING (Netherlands), RBS-CBFM (Netherlands), Allied Irish Banks (Ireland), Alpha Bank (Romania), Bank Austria Creditanstalt (Austria), Commerzbank ZRT (Hungary), Dexia Investments (Ireland), EFG Private Bank (Luxembourg), KBC Finance (Ireland), Natixis (Luxembourg), Royal Bank of Scotland (United Kingdom), WestLB AG (Germany) and Banca Comerciala Romana (Romanian Commercial Bank).
According to the document data, the lien on RCS&RDS stock was placed in the wake of an additional document signed by the parties involved on October 2007. RCS&RDS on November 6, 2007 announced its decision not to float on the London Stock Exchange.
RCS&RDS officials could not be contacted by the time this story was ready to print. RCS&RDS is a provider of cable TV, Internet, data communications and telephone services.
Besides Romania, the company also operates in Hungary, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Croatia and Serbia and registered almost 5 million customers in the first half of 2007.
According to the Top 100 Most Valuable Companies in Romania yearly ranking put together by ZF and Capital Partners, RCS&RDS' market value stood at 1.65 billion euros (2.4 billion dollars).
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