LONDON (Reuters) -Private equity firm Silver Lake is looking to raise about 1 billion euros ($1.1 billion) of debt to fund its takeover of Germany's Software AG, a term sheet seen by Reuters showed on Monday, breathing new life into the sluggish syndicated leveraged loan market.
Banks including JPMorgan (NYSE:JPM), Citigroup (NYSE:C) and Banco Santander (BME:SAN) are marketing the seven-year loan at a discount of 97 cents on the euro with interest of 500 basis points over the benchmark rate.
Commitments from investors are due by the end of the month.
To finance larger acquisitions, private equity firms have traditionally turned to banks, which stump up the necessary financing before offloading the debt to external investors.
Last year the rapid escalation of interest rates left banks unable to profit from selling debt underwritten during the preceding era of cheap money, forcing them to apply heavy discounts to attract investors and in some cases pause new lending.
After licking their wounds for months, banks are now battling to regain market share lost to private credit funds, which have become a regular source of funding even for chunky leveraged buyouts.
But banks continue to face challenges, including a drastic drop in the formation of new collateralised loan obligation (CLO) vehicles, the traditional buyers of syndicated loans.
While historically a more expensive source of capital, buyout houses are increasingly looking to private debt for certainty of funding.
Recent takeovers financed with private debt include EQT's 4.5 billion pound ($5.9 billion) intended acquisition of British veterinary products group Dechra Pharmaceuticals (LON:DPH).
Earlier this year, Software AG recommended shareholders accept Silver Lake's offer pitched at 32 euros per share, rebuffing interest from rival buyout group Bain Capital.
Software AG shareholders have until the end of Monday to tender their shares to Silver Lake. The U.S. private equity firm said last week it had already secured 71% of the company's share capital.
($1 = 0.8898 euros)
($1 = 0.7636 pounds)