California Water Service Group announced that it has entered into unsecured revolving credit facilities for Group and its subsidiaries totaling $600 million for a term of five years. Of the total, $400 million is available to California Water Service Company (Cal Water), a wholly owned subsidiary of Group, and $200 million is available to Group and the subsidiaries other than Cal Water. Additionally, the credit facilities may be expanded up to an incremental $150 million under the Cal Water facility and up to $50 million under the Group facility, subject to certain conditions. The proceeds from the credit facilities may be used for working capital purposes, including short-term financing of capital investments pending longer-term financing for those investments. The credit facilities replace the prior Group and Cal Water unsecured revolving credit facilities.
BofA Securities, Inc. acted as sole lead arranger and sole bookrunner, with CoBank and US Bank as syndication agents and Bank of China as documentation agent. Bank of America, N.A. is the administrative agent.
“I was very happy with the commitment shown to California Water Service Group from the banks in our syndication,” said Martin A. Kropelnicki, President and Chief Executive Officer. “Despite the current challenges in the banking sector, given our strong credit rating from Standard & Poor’s and with the strength of our balance sheet, we believed the time was right to replace the existing credit agreement with a new agreement that would extend our terms for an additional five years.”
