Wildu du Plessis

Wildu du Plessis
Partner
Wildu, a partner and co-founder of Alchemy, is a renowned expert on Africa. He represents and advises leading domestic and international financial institutions, private equity groups, and corporates in connection with a wide variety of financing transactions, acquisitions, restructurings, regulatory, and general finance matters. He has advised on many of the most high-profile first-to-market transactions in South Africa and is regularly ranked as one of South Africa’s leading lawyers in the fields of banking and finance, securities, capital markets, and restructuring and insolvency.
Major publishable transactions
Banking and Finance
- Advised Impala Platinum Holdings in the renegotiation of ZAR and US$-denomination revolving facilities for Impala Platinum and the renegotiation of ZAR-denomination revolving facilities for Impala Bafokeng following their acquisition of Royal Bafokeng Platinum.
- Advised Impala Platinum Holdings in relation to their various hedging facilities and documentation relating thereto.
- Advised Aveng and Moolmans Mining on new bank and asset backed facilities following their return to normalised operations.
- Advised Suez, Royal Bafokeng Holdings and AIMM in relation to their revolving and working capital facilities relating to the acquisition of the EnviroServ Group.
- Advised Rand Merchant Bank, Absa Bank, Nedbank and Ninety One as lenders to Petra Diamonds and its affiliates regarding term, revolving credit, working capital, hedging and BEE facilities amounting to more than ZAR1 billion.
- Advised Rand Merchant Bank, Standard Bank and Ashburton as lenders to Blackstar group and various affiliates regarding term and general banking facilities relating to the acquisition and further restructure of Times Media group.
- Advised Impala Platinum as borrower in relation to the financing of its acquisition of North American Palladium.
- Advised Impala Platinum and Impala Canada as borrower in relation to the refinancing of term and revolving facilities.
- Advised Impala Platinum as borrower in relation to the refinancing of revolving credit facilities.
- Advised the USD and ZAR lenders in relation to the South African security package for refinancing of facilities for Richards Bay Mining and Titanium.
- Advised Sibanye Gold and its subsidiaries in connection with their existing and new credit facilities in preparation for and following the acquisition of Stillwater Mining Company.
- Advised Absa Bank, Standard Bank and Investec Bank on the provision of a twelve month revolving facility made available to Illovo Group.
Restructuring and Insolvency
- Advised Southern Point Resources in respect of a secured production financing facility made available to Bushveld Vanchem, a member of the Bushveld Minerals group.
- Advised Aveng in relation to the final restructuring of their finance facilities originally put in place when the group experienced financial distress and the eventual cancellation of such facilities.
- Advised Atterbury Property Holdings in relation to the renegotiation of their shareholder loan from RMB Holdings (advanced through Rand Merchant Bank) and the conversion thereof to shares.
- Advised the bank and other lenders to Petra Diamonds and its subsidiaries regarding the financial restructuring of the Petra Diamonds group, including the restructuring of existing first lien bank facilities provided to Petra Diamonds and the equitisation of a portion of Petra's second lien notes debt and restructuring of the balance.
- Advised Aveng and its subsidiaries in relation to the restructure and early redemption of the notes issued under iNguza Investments (RF) Limited's asset-backed note programme referencing Aveng credit.
- Advised Development Bank of Southern Africa on its post-commencement finance loan to South African Airways as part of the airline’s business rescue process.
- Advising Citibank as notes trustee and security trustee in respect of Cell C's restructuring.
- Advising a South African airline with its restructuring related issues due to Covid-19.
- Advised Aveng and its subsidiaries in relation to the restructuring of their bank, bond and other facilities with several different funders, fiduciary duties of directors and distressed disposals of various assets.
- Advised the Bounty Brands group in connection with the multijurisdictional re-structure of certain debt facilities within the group, negotiations with various creditors and advice with regard to inter-company arrangements and ancillary advice in respect of the restructure, as instructed from time to time.
- Advised Consolidated Infrastructure Group and its subsidiaries in connection regarding the restructure of certain debt facilities, negotiations with various creditors, structure of certain inter-company arrangements and ancillary advice in respect of the proposed restructure under credit facilities with several different banks and noteholders.
- Advised ArclelorMittal on their winding up of their Saldanha Works operations.
- Advised IFC, DEG and Proparco as creditors in connection with the curatorship of African Bank and the restructuring of African Bank and African Bank Investments.
- Advised Fedsure (Investec) as shareholder in Saambou Bank in relation to what was at the time the largest banking collapse in the history of South Africa.
- Advised the senior creditors of AfriSam in relation to its restructure that resulted in the reduction of its overall debt.
- Advised the Development Bank of Southern Africa as the main secured creditor of Top TV in relation to its insolvent restructure under a South African business rescue process.
- Advised Peermont Group in respect of the various restructuring options available to them.
- Advised Great Basin Gold in respect of the business rescue of its 100% owned subsidiary, Southgold.
- Advised senior South African bank lenders to Lonmin in relation to its restructure.
- Advised senior bank lenders to Optimum Coal in relation to its restructure and business rescue.
- Advised Kudumane Resources in relation to its business rescue and eventual restructure.
- Advised Buffalo Coal in relation to its financial restructure with lenders.
Capital Markets
- Advised Impala Platinum in its public acquisition of all of the shares in Royal Bafokeng Platinum.
- Advised Southern Point Resources in connection with the subscription of up to 29.9% of the issued share capital of Bushveld Minerals, a company listed on the LSE.
- Advised on the establishment of a ZAR denominated listed note program for Basilea, an affiliate of King Price, and the issue of a first tranche of notes thereunder which are listed on the Cape Town Stock Exchange the first inward listed debt transaction on the CTSE and the first regulated debt issuance by an issuer on the CTSE.
- Advised Aveng Limited in respect of the launch of an underwritten, renounceable rights offer to raise capital.
- Advised Impala Platinum in connection with the cash incentivised early repurchase of its senior unsecured convertible bonds.
- Advised Aveng Limited in respect of the launch of a follow-on underwritten, renounceable rights offer to raise a non-disclosed capital amount.
- Advised Aveng in relation to the early redemption of its convertible bonds and the issue of new Aveng shares.
- Advised Sibanye Gold in connection with the offering by Stillwater Mining Company of senior notes in an aggregate principal amount of a non-disclosed US$ value.
- Advised Barclays Bank and Royal Bank of Canada as bookrunners in relation to the issuance by Petra Diamonds of senior secured second lien notes.
- Advised Macquarie in relation to its role as underwriter in connection with a vendor placing by Delta International Property Holdings on the Stock Exchange of Mauritius and the Johannesburg Stock Exchange.
- Advised Standard Bank on the establishment of various exchange-traded fund tracking performances of various commodities such as gold, platinum, rhodium etc.
- Advised underwriters for Celtel's Zambian IPO, the first IPO on Zambian exchange in a number of years.
- Advised Telkom SA Limited in relation to its IPO and simultaneous listing on the JSE and the NYSE, the first such simultaneous listing of a South African company.
Mining, Minerals and Natural Resources
- Advised Impala Platinum in its public acquisition of all of the shares in Royal Bafokeng Platinum.
- Advised Impala Platinum Holdings in relation to a gold streaming agreement with Triple Flag.
- Advised Moolmans Mining as lead counsel in relation to restructuring of their African businesses.
- Advised Moolmans Mining as lead counsel in relation to equipment financing transactions for fleet replacements and new mining contracts.
- Advised Impala Platinum Holdings Ltd as lead counsel in relation to their USD and ZAR based revolving credit facilities.
- Advised Newrak and Rhino Mining as lead counsel in relation to their ongoing mining contracts with various customers.
- Advised unnamed PG-metals group as lead counsel in relation to a potential acquisition of a controlling interest in a sub-Saharan African mine.