DARLINGTON-BASED van hire firm Northgate has re-financed its debt facilities.

The Company has issued a €100 million (£70m), 2.38 per cent seven year debt private placement to an institutional investor. The group’s principal bank facility has accordingly been reduced from £499m to £424m.

In addition, the principal bank facility has been renegotiated at a lower margin and the maturity has been extended by a further two years to June 2020. The flexibility of the borrowing terms has been improved and all of the Group’s financing has been moved from a secured to an unsecured basis. The key covenants remain the same.

Chris Muir, Northgate plc group finance director, said: “We are pleased to have completed this restructuring of our debt facilities. We have extended our debt maturity, reduced costs, locked into some well-priced long term debt and removed the complex security arrangements. We would like to thank our existing lenders for their ongoing support and welcome our new institutional debt investor.”