Leading Russian banana importer JFC Group has revealed that it has agreed a three-year loan of US$135m (€92.5m) with the Royal Bank of Scotland, a deal authorised by UniCredit and Alfa-Bank.
According to reports in the Russian media, part of the funds will be used to refinance a loan of US$150m (€102.8m) raised in 2007, with the remainder invested in increasing JFC's presence in European markets.
In October, JFC revealed that it had sold 19.9 per cent ofits shares to the country’s Saint-Petersburg Bank, as part of a majorfinancing deal to fund new fruit terminals in Moscow, Kazan,Ekaterinburg and Nizhniy Novgorod.
Following the bankruptcies of leading Russian groups Sorus and Sunway, JFC is nowregarded as the only major player in Russia's fruit import industry, recording a profit through the first half of 2009 of RUR236.6m (€5.3m) – a six-fold increase year-on-year.
