Hammond Hanlon Camp LLC Advises Baptist Health on Financing Transactions Totaling $303 Million
posted on November 3, 2015

 

Hammond Hanlon Camp LLC (“H2C”), a healthcare-focused investment banking firm, served as the exclusive financial advisor and placement agent to Baptist Health (“Baptist”), Louisville, Kentucky, in connection with the direct placement of $284,435,000 of Series 2009B variable rate demand bonds ("VRDBs") and the negotiation of a forward commitment to purchase $18,704,500 of Series 2010 fixed rate bonds in December 2015.

 

H2C was retained by Baptist to assist in the identification and evaluation of prospective refinancing opportunities.  Given the favorable capital markets environment, H2C recommended a competitive request for proposal (“RFP”) process for both letter of credit and direct purchase proposals.  After a broad RFP process that included national, regional and local banks, the private offering was oversubscribed by approximately four times as H2C secured a large number of highly competitive credit commitments.

 

The results of the financing included: lowering Baptist’s cost of capital by 33 bps or $1 million annually; improving financial covenants and terms; increasing the tenor of the facilities from less than one year to ten years; and, by selecting three banks, maintaining diversification of primary credit relationships.  Furthermore, placing the bonds in the bank market eliminated the daily and weekly put risk associated with VRDBs, and reduced refinancing risk.

 

“H2C worked with our management and Board to evaluate Baptist’s existing bank facilities and explain refinancing considerations and goals.  H2C’s development, negotiation and execution of the financing allowed Baptist to achieve an extremely strong outcome with significant savings for the organization.  H2C’s professional management of the process was also responsible for the completion of the financing within only one month from the selection of the banks,” stated Carl Herde, Chief Financial Officer of Baptist Health.

 

“H2C is very excited to have initiated a relationship with Baptist Health, as a leading health system in its region.  Our engagement enabled Baptist to access capital in an unusually strong bank direct purchase market, while also achieving terms that will accommodate their future operating needs as a large and growing organization,” said Elaine Yao, Managing Director at Hammond Hanlon Camp LLC.  Email Elaine