Guy Hands has won backing for plans to re-finance EMI: investors in his Terra Firma private equity firm, which owns the major, have given the green light to inject £300 million of their money into the company as a way to help alleviate debts of £2.6 million, as FT.com reports. FT.com also reports Hands is working with Barclays, JPMorgan and Morgan Stanley to secure between £200 million and £280 million from a bond issue, though an agreement could be months away. Terra Firma injected $45 million (£27.5 million) into EMI to stay on the the right side of its debt covenants.
EMI was bought out in a highly leveraged £4 billion deal in 2007, back when credit flowed, markets were bullish and private equity buy-outs made perfect sense to many companies. Now post-boom PE firms are hacing to think creatively of ways to de-leverage the companies they bought out — issuing bonds is one way of doing it. Independent News & Media has postponed a bond payment three times as it scrambles to raise the funds through selling investments.

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