Nickel: State and Aramet reach agreement on SLN debt

The state and Aramet have reached an agreement not to transfer the weight of Société Le Nickel (SLN)’s debt in New Caledonia to the accounts of its parent company Aramet, the group said in a press release on Monday.

“Following discussions held in recent weeks, the French State and Aramet have agreed to an agreement on the treatment of SLN’s existing debts”

WHO”will neutralize the debt weight of SLN in the consolidated accounts of the group.”Aramet suggested.

During the publication of its annual results on February 21, the French mining group indicated that it had recorded a charge of 218 million euros for the impairment of the value of the assets of the troubled Societe Le Nickel (SLN) in New Caledonia.

Its CEO, Kristel Boris, announced at the same time that it was in discussions with the state “Decorate the impact of this debt” from the company’s consolidated accounts while awaiting the outcome of discussions between the state, local authorities and local industrialists on an “industrial solution” and a future “nickel contract”.

This agreement is supposed to stabilize the sector, while the three Caledonian nickel factories of “Cailo” (KNS, SLN and Proni Resources) are in critical condition.

So the state and Aramet “jointly decided to convert their existing loan from SLN into quasi-equity instrument”Eramet said on Monday.

320 million euros of existing state loans to SLN, currently consolidated as financial debt in the group’s accounts, “Thus will be converted into quasi-equity, comparable in accounting terms to equity in Eramet’s consolidated accounts”the group said.

Eramet “It will also convert existing intra-group debt of 325 million euros according to the same scheme”.

group “Reiterates decision not to provide new funding to SLN”To preserve its balance sheet, however “Will continue to operationally support SLN over time.”