Metrobank grants ATI $250M credit line
Posted on February 20th, 2010
The Metropolitan Bank and Trust Company (Metrobank) has awarded the Asian Terminals Inc. (ATI) credit line worth P250 million. The ATI said the proceeds of the funds would be used to fund its projects in the next five years.
ATI, in its disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE), said it signed an agreement with Metrobank for a five-year revolving committed credit line facility. “The facility is intended as a stand-by fund to finance the project of the company in the ensuing years,” ATI said.
A subsidiary of Dubai Port World, ATI holds a 25-year right to operate container terminal A1 for the port of Batangas. Phase 1 of the Batangas port is already being operated by the company, while the movement of cargo through Phase II is being handled by ATI on a temporary basis. The company believes that once it officially takes over the operation of Phase II, it may be able to market the port better to international ship liners.
The Batangas is being groomed to be an alternative port for shipping lines to the Manila harbor, where the country’s bulk of cargoes pass through. ATI said they have already received intentions from several shipping liners to dock at the Batangas port, although they have not received any commitment from any company yet.
Rivaled only in size by ICTSI, ATI is the country’s leading port operators, and it gets bulk of its revenues from the ports it operates overseas. For the period January to September of last year, the company posted a P828 million net income, 36 percent higher than it has for the same period a year earlier. ATI is listed in the PSE, where its share price remains at P4.15 apiece as of the last trading day of last week.
