JP Morgan awarded PPC’s small securitization package

US investment bank JP Morgan has been awarded power utility PPC’s smaller of two securitization packages, carrying unpaid receivables of up to 60 days, after submitting the strongest offer to a tender at a rate of 3.5 percent.

This agreement, expected to be endorsed by PPC’s board today, represents the first, and simpler, step of the utility’s securitization plan, to be followed by a bigger-scale effort in September for unpaid receivables of at least 90 days. PPC expects an interest rate of more than 7 percent for this second package, carrying higher risk.

PPC’s securitization plan reflects the corporation’s ongoing effort to gradually regain its credibility. Offering unpaid receivables packages for cash injections would have seemed unimaginable a year ago.

The deal with JP Morgan is a non-recourse agreement, meaning PPC will not need to offer guarantees.

If companies (Qualco, legal firms) that have taken on the task of collecting unpaid receivables from PPC customers, on behalf of the utility, do not succeed, then JP Morgan, as buyer of securitization titles, will incur losses to the extent of the failure.