Crown Castle tenders for 10 3/8% and 11¼% notes

New York, Nov. 24 - Crown Castle International Corp. (B3/B-) said it was tendering for its 10 3/8% senior discount notes due 2011 and 11¼% senior discount notes due 2011 and soliciting noteholder consents to proposed changes in the notes' indentures.

It set a consent deadline of 5 p.m. ET on Dec. 9, and said the tender offer would expire at 5 p.m. ET on Dec. 23. The pricing date for the two offers will be on the third business day before the expiration, with all deadlines subject to possible extension. Notes tendered before the consent deadline can be withdrawn at any time before the deadline, but not afterward. Notes tendered after that cannot be withdrawn.

Crown Castle said the payment for the 10 3/8% notes using a formula based on the redemption price on the first call date ( $1,051.87 per $1,000 principal amount), using a 100 basis point spread over the yield on the pricing date of the reference security, the 3¼% Treasury note due May 31, 2004.

It would set payment for the 11¼% notes based on the redemption price on the first call date

($1,056.25 per $1,000 principal amount), using a 100 basis point spread over the yield on the pricing date of the 7¼% Treasury note due Aug. 15, 2004.

The total consideration for both series of notes will include a consent payment of $20 per $1,000 principal amount at maturity for those holders tendering by the consent deadline and thus giving consent to indenture changes that would eliminate substantially all of the restrictive covenants and certain events of default under the notes' respective indentures, and make certain other amendments to the indentures. Holders cannot tender their notes without delivering a consent and cannot deliver a consent without tendering their notes. Holders tendering after the consent deadline will not receive the consent payment.

The company said that the closing of each tender offer is subject to certain conditions, including the closing by the Crown Castle of its previously announced offering of 7½% senior notes due 2013, which is scheduled for Dec. 2, and the receipt of the required consents from holders.

As previously announced, Crown Castle, a Houston-based communications antenna tower owner, said on Nov. 17 that it would sell $300 million of senior notes due 2014 and use the proceeds from the offering together with existing cash balances to tender in the near term for its outstanding 10 3/8% and 11¼% notes (high yield syndicate sources said that later in that session, the company sold $300 million of new 7½% senior notes due 2013 at 96.603, for proceeds of $289.8 million).

In its most recent 10-Q quarterly filing, the company reported that as of Sept. 30, it had $390.905 million of the 10 3/8% notes outstanding, net of discount, and had $170.777 million of the 11¼% notes outstanding, net of discount.

J.P. Morgan Securities Inc. is dealer-manager and solicitation agent for the tender offers (contact Brian Tramontozzi at 212 270-9153). MacKenzie Partners, Inc. is the information agent (contact Steve Balet at 800 322-2885 or collect at 212 929-5500).

© 2015 Prospect News.
All content on this website is protected by copyright law in the U.S. and elsewhere. For the use of the person downloading only.
Redistribution and copying are prohibited by law without written permission in advance from Prospect News.
Redistribution or copying includes e-mailing, printing multiple copies or any other form of reproduction.