The Bond Buyer Announces Dallas Fort Worth Airport Financings as the “Southwest Deal Of Year”

HOUSTON — Dallas Fort Worth (DFW) airport, for which Bracewell & Giuliani LLP served as co-bond counsel, has been awarded the “Southwest Deal of the Year,” by The Bond Buyer. DFW’s $2.7 billion issuance of refunding bonds  including $1.5 billion of new money debt was mainly used to finance its terminal renewal and improvement program, a redevelopment initiative for DFW’s four oldest terminals.

The financing program had to cope with the bankruptcy of American Airlines, the airport’s hub carrier that was responsible for 85 percent of enplanements and 33 percent of revenues at DFW in 2012. It did so by taking advantage of low interest rates with a number of advantageous refunding transactions and  new money deals structured with long maturities into 2050. The airport employed a series of moderately sized transactions using 14 different underwriters and eight bond syndicates.

The Bond Buyer “Southwest Deal of the Year” award recognizes innovation in municipal finance transactions that closed between October 1, 2012, and September 30, 2013. The winners are invited to attend The Bond Buyer's Awards Gala at the Waldorf Astoria in New York on December 5, where a national “Deal of the Year” will be announced from among the finalists.

For more information about The Bond Buyer’s Southwest Deal of the Year award, please click here.