Business

Editor: evewen
9 Oct 2008 02:09:09 GMT

MANILA, Oct 8 – Philippine power producer First
Gen Corp <FGEN.PS> may borrow less than the $700 million it
needs from banks to refinance debt because of pricing
difficulties and could sell some assets, its president said on
Wednesday.

“Our banks are still very supportive. Pricing is a little
bit of an issue today but I think it’s still very doable,”
First Gen President and Chief Executive Officer Federico Lopez
told reporters.

About $400 million of the debt is due in November and the
rest in 2009, officials said.

The debt was incurred by First Gen’s $1.35 billion purchase
last year of a majority 60 percent stake in geothermal power
producer Energy Development Corp (EDC) <EDC.PS> and also
investment in a 1,000-MW natural gas-fired plant on the main
Luzon island.

Asked whether the company may borrow less than $700
million, Lopez said: “It’s a possibility and we’ll always weigh
that against pricing and other things.”

The company is looking at selling some of its assets to pay
down debt, including a 40 percent stake in a holding firm that
owns the First Gen holding in EDC and a 112-megawatt
hydroelectric power plant, Lopez and other officials said.

“In this environment where it’s very tenuous globally we
have to make sure that we can line up many other alternatives,”
said Lopez.

It was also earlier looking at raising $110 million in
three-year bonds through its unit Unified Holdings.

“That’s still ongoing,” Francis Giles Puno, chief financial
officer of conglomerate First Philippine Holdings <FPH.PS>, the
parent of First Gen, told Reuters when asked about the planned
debt issue. He did not give details.

“All of those are options being pursued.”