1997
→ In 1997 on the first months of his activities in Brazil, NationsBank’s Brazilian office were mandated as sole adviser and lead arranger for CSN on the Vale’s privatization process.
→ Mr. Alexander originated the mandate and was appointed the senior banker responsible for it, coordinating the activities performed by several groups of specialist in US and Brazil.
→ In addition to the advisory, NationsBank arranged the first acquisition financing facility and arrange a group of well-known financial investors as co-investors with CSN. These conditions allowed the CSN winning of the auction.
→ The credit facility was the first fully dedicated loan to a privatization auction in Brazil ever and amounted US$1,2billion. The facility was fully arranged and guaranteed by NationsBank and syndicated after to Banker’s Trust, Chase Manhattan, SBC Warburg and Santander.
→ The group of co-investors were organized under a special purpose vehicle (Sweet River Investments) and invested US$150million dollars. The group included, among others, the Quantum Fund (Soros) and the Brazilian Banco Liberal. They ended up controlling around 5% of the shares.
→ The transaction was awarded Privatization of the Year and Deal of the Decade by Latin Finance magazine
2000
→ In September 2000, Vale, the third largest mining company in the world, through its full subsidiary CVRD FINANCE LTD., issued US$300MM on the international bond market.
→ Due to a sophisticated securitization structure of its Carajás high quality iron ore exports, the CVRD FINANCE LTD bonds were the first investment graded issue from a fully owned Brazilian company subsidiary (Brazil was not Investment Grade at that time).
→ As Bank of America´s Head of Brazilian Capital Markets, Mr. Alexander oversaw the negotiation and structuring of every step of the transaction, coordinating a team of Bank of America´s specialists and the Brazilian office.
