Struggling retailer Gap (GPS +3.60%) is raising $2.25 billion by issuing new debt, the company announced Thursday.
This will come from three senior secured notes. The first has an aggregate principal amount of $500 million, an annual interest rate of 8.375%, and matures in 2023. The second is a $750 million issue bearing a rate of 8.625% and maturing in 2025. The third's aggregate principal amount is $1 billion, its interest is 8.875%, and it matures in 2025.
Gap will utilize the net proceeds of these issues to refinance the outstanding amounts under a $500 million revolving credit facility that expires in May 2023 and "for general corporate purposes." It believes the issues of the notes will close on or around Thursday, May 7.
Image source: Gap.
These planned flotations are, in the company's words, "contingent on, and expected to occur simultaneously with, an amendment, modification, replacement, or refinancing with lenders under our existing revolving credit facility, which may include our entering into an amended and restated senior secured asset-based revolving credit facility in an initial aggregate principal amount of up to $2 billion."
Gap was encountering difficulties in its business even before the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus outbreak spread around the world. Its sales were declining; meanwhile, it maintained a large bricks-and-mortar footprint in the age of the "retail apocalypse."
The pressure the coronavirus is putting on the consumer economy is hammering Gap even more, to the point where it might not be able to continue as a viable business. It recently revealed that it has not paid rent for its stores in April.
On Thursday, Gap closed marginally lower. That essentially matched the flat-to-minor-losses of the key stock market indexes and the performance of certain peer consumer goods companies.
