Hot on the heels of American Airlines tightly-priced EETC issued while in bankruptcy, merger partner US Airways has beaten AA’s pricing by a slight margin on the A notes. Yesterday US Airways priced two tranches of enhanced equipment trust certificates (EETC) – US Airways Series 2013-1 – worth $$819,613,000, which priced at a record low.
The $620.095 million Class A certificates, with an expected final maturity of 12.6 years and average life of 8.5 years, with ratings of Ba1/BBB/A- expected, carry a coupon of 3.950%. The $199.518 million B notes, with a final maturity of 8.6 years and average life of 7.2 years, carry a B1/B+/BB+ and a coupon of 5.375%. The initial and maximum loan-to-value of the A notes is 54.3% with 72.1% on the B slice. A C Class tranche may be issued at a later date.
Goldman Sachs is bookrunner and structuring agent, Citigroup and Morgan Stanley are bookrunner. Co-managers are Barclays, Bank of American Merrill Lynch and Natixis. Natixis is the depository bank and also provides the liquidity facility for the Class A and Class B certificates.
The US Airways 2013-1 EETC will finance a pool of 18 aircraft comprised of 14 new Airbus A321-231 aircraft and four new Airbus A330-243 aircraft, all of which are scheduled to be delivered from September 2013 to June 2014.
The book was more than four times oversubscribed, which mean that the deal priced well inside of guidance. Reports state that many high quality accounts piled into the deal, with demand being “driven by positive investor sentiment on the merger with AMR and by the high quality collateral”.