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Riverdeep deal progresses

22.11.07

Education publisher HM Riverdeep's bankers are at an advanced stage in selling down $7.15bn of debt in the group, reports the Irish Independent. The debt mainly relates to its planned $4bn deal to buy Reed Elsevier's Harcourt US education business.

The debt placing is in defiance of ongoing turbulent conditions in the global credit markets.

The newspaper quotes "an informed source" on the recent drive by the banks to market the debt on both sides of the Atlantic: "The feedback we've been getting from the roadshow has been encouraging. We'd be reasonably comfortable at this stage."

The banks -- Credit Suisse, Lehman Brothers and Citigroup -- committed to underwrite the Harcourt deal and the refinancing of the entire group in July, just weeks before global credit markets went into a tailspin.

"The time of the deal was very fortunate [for Riverdeep], in retrospect. It would have struggled to get the same bank guarantees and under the same terms even a month later," said another source, according to the Independent.

Riverdeep is also waiting for regulatory clearance from the US Department of Justice for the Harcourt deal.

Irish Independent

reed elsevier Riverdeep

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