Use More Bullets for Funding Requests
TIPS
Problem: Decision-makers just want to know what you want. A common complaint sounds like the following:
“I read the proposal and never did get what they want or why,” or “why can’t they just tell me up front what they want” in a presentation.
Possible Causes: Too close to the deal, bank book very unclear, anxiety about being wrong, all of which feed overwriting and over-justifying, resulting in something that looks like the following:
Transaction:
To establish a new $52MM interest rate swap line with maximum tenor of 10-year for Big Oil Chemical and its wholly owned sub, to accommodate pre-hedging/hedging needs and the company’s strategy of moving from 100% fixed ratio to an 80%/20% fixed /floating ratio. Big Oil Chemical has $500MM in Senior Notes coming due in XXX that it plans to refinance with a 5-year or 10-year bond issuance. (See page 46 of the application package for the rationale /calculation of the requested amount.)
Got that? Let’s try again with bullet points.
Quick Solution:
- Use bullets for all lists of straightforward requests.
- Present rationale in the next section.
Here’s the same request in bullets:
Transaction Request:
- New $52MM interest rate swap line with maximum 10-year tenor for Big Oil Chemical and its wholly owned subsidiary.
- Aligns with company’s strategy of moving from 100% fixed ratio to an 80%/20% fixed /floating ratio.
- Amount based on Company’s planned refinance of $500MM in Senior Notes due in XXX through bond issuances.
