Airbnb secures €913m loan days after debt deal amid Covid-19 fallout
Home rental firm Airbnb said it secured a new $1bn (€913m) loan just days after closing a $1bn debt deal, to help it get through the Covid-19 crisis.
The lenders include private equity firms Silver Lake, Apollo Global Management, Sixth Street Partners, Oaktree Capital Management and Owl Rock, sources told Reuters.
The terms of the new deal are first lien debt, meaning these creditors would be paid first if Airbnb were to default, the sources said.
Meanwhile, Irish-based paper and packaging giant Smurfit Kappa said it had cancelled plans to pay a final dividend because of the deteriorating world economic outlook. It said, however, all its facilities remained open in the first quarter. Its shares ended 3.5% lower in the latest session.
In its update, Irish-based UDG Healthcare said it posted "a strong start to the financial year" with pre-tax profits for the six months to the end of March 2020 "well ahead of the same period last year." Its shares nonetheless closed about 5% lower.
And shares in online gambling firm 888 fell 7% fell as profits before tax more than halved last year, hit by additional gaming duties. It also flagged growing risks of gambling-related harm as more stuck-at-home Europeans bet online amid nationwide lockdowns to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
The company did not give hard figures for its performance since the lockdowns took hold across Europe in March, but said that as a purely online operator, it was “confident” of managing the business challenges they present.
