The group is understood to include Dammam-based Arab Petroleum Investments Corporation (Apicorp), Arab National Bank (ANB), Banque Saudi Fransi, Gulf International Bank (GIB), Riyad Bank, Saudi American Bank,Saudi Hollandi Bank, Saudi Investment Bank and Sumitomo-Mitsui Banking Corporation.

‘They’ve hit the sweet spot in terms of timing on this transaction,’ says a banker interested in the transaction. ‘There are a number of institutions which are hungry to book some assets before the end of the year, and for a lot of these banks there aren’t any other deals in town. Saudi Chevron got subscriptions of over $900 million for this deal and that’s not because they overpriced it.’

Bankers close to the deal say that the margin on the facility will be tight, somewhere around 110 basis points of Libor. ‘This is not generous but they don’t need to be when there’s this much demand,’ says the banker. ‘If the timing had been different the banks might have been a little more aggressive.’

The facility will have a tenor of just over 12 years. SCPC will use the funds for a combination of refinancing and fresh borrowing. About $225 million will be used to replace a $305 million facility signed in 2001, which was itself a refinancing of an original facility signed in 1997, for the part-financing of a petrochemicals facility in Jubail (MEED 11:5:01; 14:3:97). The remaining $245 million will be fresh finance (MEED 10:10:03).

SCPC acted without a financial adviser on the transaction.