Windstream finalizes term B-4 at $1.35 billion, sets par offer price

By Sara Rosenberg

New York, Jan. 10 - Windstream Corp. firmed the size of its seven-year term loan B-4 at $1,345,000,000, the wide end of the revised talk of $1 billion to $1,345,000,000 and up from initial plans for $300 million, according to a market source.

Also, the offer price on the term loan came at par, the low end of revised guidance of 99¾ to par, and tighter than initial talk of 991/2, the source said.

Pricing on the loan is Libor plus 275 basis points with a 0.75% Libor floor, and there is 101 soft call protection for one year.

When the first round of changes was made to the loan, the Libor floor firmed at the tight end of the 0.75% to 1% talk.

Commitments were due on Thursday afternoon.

Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Barclays, Wells Fargo Securities LLC, Goldman Sachs & Co., Deutsche Bank Securities Inc., Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, Morgan Stanley Senior Funding Inc. and SunTrust Robinson Humphrey Inc. are leading the deal. J.P. Morgan Securities LLC is the administrative agent.

Proceeds will be used to repay a term loan A-2, a term loan B-1 and, because of the upsizing, a term loan B-2. As of June 30, 2012, the company had $20.8 million of term loan A-2 debt due July 17, 2013, $282.4 million of term loan B-1 debt due July 17, 2013 and $1.05 billion of term loan B-2 debt due Dec. 17, 2015.

Closing is expected before the end of this month.

Windstream is a Little Rock, Ark.-based provider of advanced network communications, including cloud computing and managed services, to businesses.

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