OCBC Bank (M) Bhd head of investment banking Tan Ai Chin
PETALING JAYA: The presence of a dedicated multi-disciplinary investment banking team is key to successful loan and project finance syndication exercises, according to OCBC Bank (M) Bhd senior banker and head of global investment banking and corporate development Tan Ai Chin.
She told StarBiz a team built on this philosophy covers the entire value chain of work processes featuring origination of clients, determination of their requirements, deal structuring, inviting and screening of syndicate lenders, negotiation of terms and loan documents, financial close and even after-closure support in the form of agency management.
“This is how we have been operating for several years now, and I believe it was the single most critical ingredient for landing us several best loan house and project finance awards last year, not to mention our consistent track record as the top three lead arrangers of loan syndications over the past several years.
“Through a multi-disciplinary team, clients have seamless engagement with a bank that fully understands the gamut of their needs. The last thing a client would ever want is to deal with several disconnected units within a bank that does not work seamlessly. They are looking for specialisations within the same team, not a loosely assembled group of specialists.
“This is what really stands behind the quest to play a cradle-to-grave role; we create something out of sheer nascence and end things off with a syndication that is successfully concluded with the relevant documents firmly in place and thereafter active agency management until the loan is fully paid off,” she said.
The awards Tan referred to include the coveted Best Loan House in Malaysia Award from respected trade publication The Asset in recognition of the loan transactions arranged and participated by OCBC Bank spanning several sectors such as oil & gas, real estate, healthcare, plantation and telecommunication. They were funded both onshore and offshore, comprising both conventional and Islamic, and in multiple currencies.
As one of the leading arrangers and bookrunners in the Malaysian loans market, Tan said the bank is often called on to play the key role of lead-arranging and coordinating a syndicate of banks to provide a common financing structure to a client. And the current approach has held them in good stead.
“The ability to understand comprehensively the requirements of clients and match these to the expectation of the syndicate banks is critical. This includes the task of taking the lead in deliberation with the syndicate lenders to arrive at a common platform that is mutually beneficial to all stakeholders.
"The ultimate goal is to facilitate a balanced risk reward mechanism,” she said, adding that many of OCBC Bank’s clients are repeat ones who have come to value the place of trust in the equation.
“Then there is the need to coordinate a tailored financing structure that is sufficiently flexible to meet the current and ever changing requirements of the clients’ business, industry and project; this cannot be under-stated. A lack of fluidity and too much rigidity in structures can mark the downfall of any syndication exercise,” she said.
OCBC Bank’s syndication capability was recognised through two other significant awards last year, apart from the Best Loan House from The Asset.
They also won the Asian Banking and Finance Wholesale Banking Award for Malaysia International Project Finance Bank of the Year 2016 in recognition of their successful coordination and arrangement of mega project finance deals that often involved multiple stakeholders and in different sectors, both onshore and offshore.
This was particularly significant for being the first time such an award was accorded by the publication.
The Bank also won The Asset’s Best Syndicated Loan for Myanmar 2016 in recognition of their success in lead coordinating the first syndicated financing by onshore foreign banks since the Myanmar financial sector was opened to foreign banks in 2015.
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