CC, Sullivan and W&C take on Eurotunnel restructuring

A trio of firms have secured the mandate to advise Goldman Sachs and Macquarie on the ongoing Eurotunnel restructuring.

Clifford Chance and Sullivan & Cromwell have been instructed to advise the banks, which are hoping to finance a deal to slash Eurotunnel’s debt from £6.2bn to £2.9bn. The Goldman and Macquarie proposal was unveiled by Eurotunnel’s management late last month.

White & Case, meanwhile, is advising some of the debt providers.

The instruction is a coup for Clifford Chance because the magic circle firm was dropped from the restructuring in 2004 after its clients Merrill Lynch and Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein were ditched by Eurotunnel as financial advisers.

Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer is understood to have been brought in by Eurotunnel to advise the Channel Tunnel operator on the restructuring alongside the London office of Weil Gotshal & Manges.

Herbert Smith which was until last May Eurotunnel’s sole legal adviser on the reorganisation has been retained to advise the company in a secondary role because of its previous work on the deal.

Linklaters partner Richard Holden is advising the ad hoc creditors committee.

Meanwhile, Kirkland & Ellis, Cadwalader Wickersham & Taft and Debevoise & Plimpton are acting for the European Investment Bank, MBIA and Oaktree respectively. Colin Bogie is leading the Debevoise team while Andrew Wilkinson is leading the Cadwalader team advising MBIA.

Allen & Overy is advising the infra-junior creditors (the Eurotunnel bondholders committee), which has rejected the Goldman proposal.

Eurotunnel’s shareholders are expected to vote on the Goldman-led proposal on 12 July

Cadwalader, Sullivan & Cromwell and Weil Gotshal did not return calls for comment. All the other firms declined to comment.