Christianne Williams

Christianne is a U.S. partner in our London office and focusses on high yield bonds and leveraged finance transactions across Europe and emerging markets.

Christianne has extensive experience advising financial institutions and corporates on complex cross-border leveraged finance transactions, in particular high yield bond offerings, acquisition financing and debt liability management transactions. She has significant expertise in the natural resources sector.

In addition, Christianne regularly advises on high yield restructurings, both on creditor and debtor side.

Work highlights

Christianne has advised a wide range of clients on their significant financing transactions. These include advising:

High yield issuances

• the initial purchasers on the offering by Oslo Stock Exchange listed Shelf Drilling, a leading shallow water offshore drilling contractor, of over $1bn of senior notes, and the dealer manager in respect of the related tender offers for Shelf Drilling’s existing senior notes and senior secured first lien notes

• First Quantum Minerals, a Toronto Stock Exchange-listed global copper company, on issuances of in excess of $6.5bn of senior notes 
• the initial purchasers in connection with the offering by Altice International, a multinational broadband and mobile communications, content and media group operating in Portugal, Israel and the Dominican Republic, of US$1.9bn and €700m of senior notes
• the initial purchasers on the offering by Cablevision Lightpath, a provider of communications and bandwidth infrastructure in the New York City area and a subsidiary of Altice USA, of $865m senior secured notes in connection with Altice’s sale of a 49.99% stake in Cablevision Lightpath
• Neinor Homes, a real estate residential development platform in Spain listed on the Madrid, Barcelona, Bilbao and Valencia Stock Exchanges, on its green bond debut high yield offering of €300m of senior secured notes
• Petra Diamonds, the London-listed rough diamond producer with assets in South Africa, on its offering of $650m senior secured second lien notes

Liability management

• the dealer managers in relation to the tender offers by London-listed oil and gas company Tullow Oil plc for its senior notes due 2025 and senior secured notes due 2026
• the dealer manager in relation to the tender offer by Sarens, a global leader in crane rental services, heavy lifting, and engineered transport, for a portion of its senior notes due 2027
• the dealer managers in relation to tender offers by global resources company BHP Billiton for in excess of US$3bn of its senior notes in connection with its debt repurchase programme
• First Quantum Minerals on its exchange offer for $2bn of senior notes issued by Inmet Mining Corporation

Restructuring

• certain shareholders and creditors of The LYCRA Company on the comprehensive refinancing of the company’s debt maturing in 2023. The refinancing represented one of the most innovative “drop-down financing” transactions that had been seen in the European market to date.
• an ad hoc group of lenders holding approximately $175m in senior secured term debt in the prepackaged Chapter 11 cases of Pioneer Energy Services Inc.
• the committee of senior secured bondholders of New Look, the UK-headquartered national fashion retailer, on the amendment of its high yield bond terms in connection with a Company Voluntary Arrangement (CVA) of its store portfolio
• Gulf Keystone Petroleum on its balance sheet restructuring by way of Scheme of Arrangement