DiamondCorp Secures $27M for Lace Development
Sep 23, 2012 7:38 AM
By Deena Taylor
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RAPAPORT... DiamondCorp secured a $26.7 million loan from South Africa’s Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) to develop a block cave mining operation at the company’s owned Lace mine. The loan covers 77 percent of the peak funding requirements for the South African project, in which DiamondCorp owns a 74 percent stake. The company will repay the loan over a seven-year period at an interest rate of 2 percent over South Africa's prime rate, which is currently 8.5 percent.
"I am very pleased that the terms of the IDC loan facility have been finalized amid difficult market conditions,'' said DiamondCorp's chief executive, Paul Loudon. "This represents a major milestone for our company's transition from developer to a medium-sized diamond mining company and we look forward to finalizing the balance of our project funding requirements as soon as possible."
DiamondCorp will raise another $12.1 million prior to the initial drawdown of the new Lace debt facility. The group is currently considering a number of options to complete the total financing and has appointed Rand Merchant Bank and PSG Capital as advisers and arrangers in South Africa to raise up to $18.1 million through the issue of convertible bonds.
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Tags:
Deena Taylor, DiamondCorp, Lace Mine
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