A&O advises Starwood on its financing to Blackstone for the AUD 8.9bn acquisition of Crown Resorts

London partner David Varne commented: “We were thrilled to advise our longstanding client, Starwood, on this landmark transaction. It is one of the biggest Australian public M&A deals of the year and, given the three key Australian casino assets, the real estate financing angle was one of a kind.”

Sydney partner David Walter added: “This transaction demonstrates the continued appetite of both alternative credit providers such as Starwood and private equity funds like Blackstone, to invest in the Asia Pacific region. We are seeing an increasing trend of investing into Australia among these key players.”

The silver financing was led out of London by partner David Varne, senior associate George Meale, associate Olivia Manley, trainee Linda Chausheva and paralegal Esther Suresh. The Australian financing was led out of Sydney by partner David Walter, counsel Andrew Daidone and Siqi Chen, Ciara Connolly and Yasmin Love. Partner Michael Parshall provided specialist corporate law advice. More broadly the deal also involved Singapore partner Prakash Segaran and associate Ryan Goh and New York senior counsel Stefanie Dude Karidis and associate Kayla Epstein.

A&O also had separate roles providing English law advice to Deutsche Bank as super senior revolving credit provider to Crown and Trimont as facility agent and security agent on behalf of the lenders. London partner Philip Bowden and Madrid partner Tom Wilkinson acted for Deutsche Bank and London partner Luke Lewis acted for Trimont.