Future looks brighter for Norwegian – successfully raises NOK 6 million in capital

Seabury Securities LLC (Seabury), the investment banking arm of Seabury Capital Group LLC, has announced that acting as Lead Financial Restructuring Adviser, it has successfully helped Norwegian Air Shuttle ASA (Norwegian) complete its multi-jurisdictional financial restructuring while also raising SEK6 billion in capital. This latest news comes as a culmination of the involvement of courts in Norway, Ireland and the U.S.

Having initially raised NOK 3 billion of debt with the Norwegian Government in mid-2020 through a NOK 10 billion debt-to-equity swap, in November 2020, the Government announced it would not support a second capital injection without further restructuring of the airline. With the support of Seabury as Lead Financial Restructuring Advisor, BAHR AS, as lead Counsel, and Matheson, as Irish counsel, Norwegian entered an Irish Examinership (the Irish version of U.S. Chapter 11) with Kieran Wallace from KPMG as Examiner. In December 2020, Norwegian entered a Norwegian Reconstruction process as well under the leadership of Havard Wiker, from Ro Sommernes, as Reconstructor. After support to the process provided by Norwegian’s shareholders and creditors, judgements validating the successful Irish Examinership and Norwegian Reconstruction was passed in February and March 2020 subject to a minimum recapitalization of NOK 4.5 billion.

A U.S. recognition of those judgement through a U.S. Chapter 15 process has also been undertaken. Today’s NOK 6 billion capital raise comprises NOK 1,875 million of a convertible perpetual bond, a NOK 395 million rights issue, and the remainder as private placement, including a series of strategic Nordic investors. Norwegian will now focus on flying narrow-body aircraft with a fleet starting at 51 Boeing 737NG aircraft but aimed at increasing in 2022 to 70 aircraft. During this restructuring process, the airline has substantially reduced its liabilities mainly through the cancelation of aircraft orders with Airbus and Boeing worth NOK 85 billion. (US$1.00 = NOK 8.36 at time of publication.)