(Bloomberg) -- Drinks maker Refresco shelved a €2.1 billion ($2.3 billion) leveraged loan repricing on Thursday, as sentiment sours among junk debt investors.
Refresco is the fourth company to pull a deal from the European market in the space of a week. All four have had opportunistic slants: UK production company All3Media and French insurance broker April Group last week withdrew proposals to repricing their existing facilities, while crop-protection company Rovensa pulled a planned €1.1 billion loan refinancing and extension.
Cracks are emerging in the leveraged loan markets in both Europe and the US, as President Donald Trump’s tariff threats trigger economic uncertainty. Pricing in the secondary market has fallen dramatically since the beginning of the month while the compensation investors are demanding for new issue leveraged loans is rising sharply.
Proceeds from the Refresco deal were set to reprice the company’s existing €1.965 billion term loan B, as well as repaying revolving credit facilities and general corporate purposes.
Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, KKR Capital Markets and Morgan Stanley were the lead banks on the transaction. Spokespeople for Goldman, Citi and MS declined to comment, while KCM and Refresco didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
The pulled deals set up a potentially complicated backdrop for the €8.65 billion debt package backing Clayton Dubilier & Rice’s purchase of a stake in Sanofi SA’s consumer health division. Lenders including Goldman Sachs and Citigroup have kicked off a pre-marketing process for the financing, with the aim of launching a general syndication as early as next week.