SeaDrill : SDRL - Amendments to Certain Credit Facilities to Insulate Seadrill Partners from Seadrill Limited's Restructuring

Hamilton, Bermuda, August 17, 2017 - Seadrill Limited ("SDRL or the Company") announces today that it has completed amendments to three secured credit facilities that relate to rigs purchased by Seadrill Partners from the Company that will insulate Seadrill Partners from events of default related to the Company's likely use of chapter 11 proceedings to implement its restructuring plan. 

 

The amendments to the three facilities remove Seadrill Partners and its consolidated entities as a borrower or guarantor and separate the facilities such that each resulting Seadrill Limited facility is secured only by Seadrill Limited's assets without recourse to Seadrill Partners or its assets.

 

This transaction is part of the Company's comprehensive restructuring plan that is intended to preserve the value of its equity stakes in Seadrill Partners and its consolidated entities.

 

Discussions continue with certain third party and related party investors and its secured lenders on the terms of a comprehensive recapitalization. As previously disclosed, we continue to believe that implementation of a comprehensive restructuring plan will likely involve chapter 11 proceedings, and we are preparing accordingly. It is likely that the comprehensive restructuring plan will require a substantial impairment or conversion of our bonds, as well as impairment and losses for other stakeholders, including shipyards. As a result, the Company currently expects that shareholders are likely to receive minimal recovery for their existing shares.

 

The Company's business operations remain unaffected by these restructuring efforts and the Company expects to continue to meet its ongoing customer and business counterparty obligations.

 

 

FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENTS

 

This news release includes forward looking statements. Such statements are generally not historical in nature, and specifically include statements about the Company's plans, strategies, business prospects, changes and trends in its business, the markets in which it operates and its restructuring efforts. These statements are made based upon management's current plans, expectations, assumptions and beliefs concerning future events impacting the Company and therefore involve a number of risks, uncertainties and assumptions that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied in the forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this news release. Consequently, no forward-looking statement can be guaranteed. When considering these forward-looking statements, you should keep in mind the risks described from time to time in the Company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including its Annual Report on Form 20-F (File No. 001-34667). The Company undertakes no obligation to update any forward looking statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date on which such statement is made or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events. New factors emerge from time to time, and it is not possible for the Company to predict all of these factors. Further, the Company cannot assess the impact of each such factor on its business or the extent to which any factor, or combination of factors, may cause actual results to be materially different from those contained in any forward looking statement

 

This information is subject of the disclosure requirements pursuant to section 5-12 of the Norwegian Securities Trading Act.