Puma Secures €500 Million Bridge Loan from Banco Santander for Debt Refinancing

Puma receives a financial injection. The German sports fashion group has announced the refinancing of its debt through a €500 million bridge loan with Banco Santander, as well as additional credit lines confirmed for €108 million.

Puma thus acquires €600 million to refinance the revolving credit line it maintains for €1.2 billion, “increasing financial flexibility and available room for maneuver,“ Puma said in a statement on Friday. Both the bridge loan and the additional confirmed credit lines have a maturity of up to two years.

The loan will allow the company to “execute its strategic priorities” and “advance its ambition to consolidate Puma as one of the top three global sports brands,“ explains the German group’s chief financial officer, Markus Neubrand.

Puma acquires a total amount of €600 million maturing in two years

Puma closed the first nine months of the year with a drop in sales of 8.5%, and posted losses of more than €300 million. The company thus confirmed the downward trend that began in the first half of the year. This poor performance has taken shape with the announcement of the first job cuts.

More specifically, the German company posted sales of €5.97 billion in the first nine months of the current fiscal year, compared with €6.52 billion in the same period of the previous year. Gross profit amounted to €2.75 billion, with a gross margin of 46.1%, 1.3 percentage points lower than in the previous year.

In this regard, Puma has been in the eye of the storm in the international sports industry in recent months, with the Chinese group Anta reportedly studying its possible acquisition, while in the middle of the year the market speculated that Adidas would take over Puma.