BRITISH rolling stock company Porterbrook Leasing has put together a package to fund over 400 new vehicles. It includes a £273m securitisation arranged by Union Bank of Switzerland and a £90m corporate facility from UBS and Royal Bank of Scotland. The European Investment Bank is lending £110m (Ecu170m), and the European Investment Fund is providing a subordinated guarantee. Overall annualised cost of the deal including charges, is around 7·5%.

Finance Director of parent Stagecoach Holdings Keith Cochrane says Porterbrook’s portfolio management approach has helped secure the funding against residual risk, with the securitisation running to 2011 although several of the leases expire in 2002-03.

The funding will be drawn down as required to meet stage payments on the new trains, and the loans will be repaid using rental income from both the new stock and existing trains in the Porterbrook fleet.

Excluded from the deal is the fleet of DMUs for Anglia Railways, as the innovative ’no trains/no pay’ agreement makes the funding unsuitable for securitisation. o

TABLE: New Porterbrook rolling stock

Operator Type Builder Cars úm*

Chiltern DMU Adtranz 20 17

Gatwick Express EMU GEC Alsthom 64 60

LTS Rail EMU Adtranz 176 133

Midland Main Line DMU Adtranz 34 31

ScotRail DMU Adtranz 27 24

South West Trains EMU GEC Alsthom 120 91

Total funding arranged 441 363

Anglia DMU Adtranz 24 26

Freightliner Locos/wagons - 12

Central Trains DMU Adtranz 26 23

* estimated split of official total value

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