Emirates yesterday (December 5, 2000) signed a US$ 85 million financing agreement for the acquisition of the eleventh of 21 Airbus A330-200 aircraft powered by Rolls Royce Trent engines, which the carrier has on firm order. The aircraft is scheduled for delivery to the airline in Toulouse on December 15, 2000.

The financing is structured as a 12-year Japanese operating lease arranged by Credit Agricole Indosuez, and is financed using commercial debt. The other banks involved are Kreditanstalt Fur Wiederaufbau, Norddeutsche Landesbank Girozentrale and DGZ.DekaBank-Deutsche Kommunalbank. The commercial debt is financed at a weighted average margin of 62 basis points over London Inter-bank Offered Rate (Libor).

Maurice Flanagan, Emirates’ Group Managing Director, signed the financing documents with Anne-Marie Siffroy Pytlak, Head of Aircraft Financing; Sitor Senghor and Mohamed Saleh of Credit Agricole Indosuez; Ludolf Rischmuller and Christian Elias, from Kreditanstalt Fur Wiederaufbau; Harald Brauns and Rebecca Tomicic, from Norddeutsche Landesbank; and Angelika Beyer from DGZ.DekaBank-Deutsche Kommunalbank

In addition to the 21 A330-200s, Emirates also has on order seven B777-300s and six long-range A340-500s. It has options on a further four B777s, five A330-200s and ten A340-500s.

At the recent Farnborough air show, Emirates became the first airline to sign a firm commitment for the world’s largest airliner, the A3XX, making it the pioneer customer for this prestigious Airbus program.

Dermot Mannion, Emirates’ Chief Director Finance, IT & Services, said: “We are very grateful for the continuing support of Credit Agricole Indosuez which is a major player in the aircraft financing market. In this deal, they have used their Japanese presence to create a low-cost funding structure, making this the third wide-bodied Emirates aircraft to be financed in this manner during 2000.”

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