Rumo sells 80% of its stake in Port of Santos terminals in billion-dollar deal

In a billion-dollar deal, Rumo sold 80% of its stake in two of the largest grain and sugar terminals in the Port of Santos to the company Corredor Logística e Infraestrutura (CLI). The contract was signed on Friday, July 15, for R$ 1.4 billion.

According to Rumo, the sale is part of a “strategy to form long-term partnerships and focus on rail logistics.” Now, CLI will operate, in partnership with Rumo, Elevações Portuárias S/A (EPSA), the company responsible for terminals 16 and 19 of the Santos port complex.

Nearly BRL 600 million will be made available in the coming years, fostering a 20% expansion in the current grain volume. The partnership does not involve the other terminals that have Rumo as a partner in the port of Santos: TXXXIX, Terminal Marítimo do Guarujá (Termag) and Terminal de Granéis do Guarujá (TGG).

Capital expansion

The agreement that put CLI (whose shareholding control is held by IG4 Capital) in control of the previously Rumo-owned terminals resulted from a BRL 500 million capital expansion process made possible by an Australian infrastructure fund, Macquarie Infrastructure Partners V (MIP V), which focuses on the Americas and is linked to the Australian bank Macquarie.

As a result, IG4 and MIP V will share control of CLI and, in the case of Porto Santos, will own 80% of EPSA’s shares, with the remaining 20% staying with Rumo. The operation depends on approvals from the National Waterway Transportation Agency (Antaq) and the Administrative Council for Economic Defense (Cade) to be consecrated.

Future expectations

CLI is one of the four operators of the Maranhão Grain Terminal (Tegram) and functions as a white flag independent operator. According to Hélcio Tokeshi, CEO of CLI, “we are 100% white flag, fully in control of our Tegram terminal, where 25% of operations are held in a consortium. The same successful model in Itaqui will be applied in Santos.”

According to the executive director of Macquarie, also responsible for infrastructure investments in Brazil, Fernando Lohmann, in addition to acting in this market, the bank has “long exposure to Brazilian agribusiness.” Thus, the partnership with IG4 and Rumo is a “natural step to strengthen this connection between infrastructure and agriculture.”

According to Paulo Mattos, co-founder and CEO of IG4 Capital, CLI has become the country’s largest independent operator of port infrastructure and logistics for agribusiness due to its relationship with Rumo and its cooperation with Macquarie. “We are quite confident in our ability to increase CLI’s performance as a sector infrastructure platform and engage in such a robust and strategic experience in conjunction with Rumo in the country’s largest port complex.”

Rumo’s Commercial Vice-President, Pedro Palma, cites the completion of the North-South Railway, the construction of the first state railway in Mato Grosso, and the investments in improvements in Santos as part of the “strategy to expand a competitive railway logistics for agribusiness.”

According to Palma, Rumo already has three of the four terminals in operation in the Central Rail Network (Malha Central) that belong to partner companies. “It is this successful format that we are replicating now in Santos with CLI,” he explains.

Source: A Tribuna 

To read the full original article, please go to:

https://www.atribuna.com.br/noticias/portomar/em-negociacao-bilionaria-rumo-vende-80-de-sua-participacao-em-terminais-do-porto-de-santos

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