Ukraine's Oschadbank secures agreement of Eurobond 2025 holders to ease covenants

MOSCOW. Oct 10 (Interfax) - Oschadbank secured the agreement of investors in its Eurobond issue maturing in 2025 to change a number of lending terms at a second meeting on Friday, specifically to suspend the covenant requiring the Ukrainian state bank to maintain capital adequacy for the duration of martial law in Ukraine and six months thereafter.

Given that the holders of the bank's Eurobonds maturing in 2023 agreed to the same changes on September 22, all the terms of both bond issues have now been met and these changes will be formalized soon, Ukrainian media quoted Oschadbank as saying in an exchange statement.

A meeting of the holders of Oschadbank Eurobonds maturing in 2025 that was scheduled for September 22 failed to gather a quorum, so it was rescheduled for October 7.

The bank is also asked bondholders to approve the postponement of publication of the report for 2021 and payment of dividends in the amount of UAH318.117 million rubles.

Oschadbank noted that the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) decided back on February 25 that it would not impose sanctions against banks for violating capital requirements, including minimum capital adequacy requirements.

Another Ukrainian state bank, Ukreximbank secured the agreement of its Eurobond holders in June to suspend the covenant on maintaining capital adequacy for the duration of martial law and six months thereafter.

In 2015, Oschadbank restructured Eurobonds maturing in 2016 and 2018 totaling $1.2 billion. The restructuring called for extending the duration of the bonds and changing the interest rate. The maturity of Eurobonds totalling $700 million was extended to March 10, 2023, with the rate raised to 9.375%, and the maturity of bonds totalling $500 million was extended to March 20, 2025 with the rate going up to 9.625%.

The amortization of the 2023 Eurobonds called for 60% of the principal to be paid on March 10, 2019 and the remainder in eight equal semiannual instalments. Holders of the 2025 Eurobonds were supposed to get 50% of the principal on March 20, 2020 and the rest in ten equal semiannual instalments.

The official exchange rate on October 7 was UAH36.57/$1.