PROGRAMME:

NEW: SYMPOSIUM FEATURE

FUTURE  CASE STUDY:  A MULTI-LAYERED DEAL GOES INTO DEFAULT

HIGHER RISK, LOWER RETURNS &

REAL STRUCTURAL CHANGES:

How can mezzanine adapt and prosper?

1:00 PM – 1:30 PM

REGISTRATION

CHAIRMAIN'S OPENING REMARKS

Time for a Reality Check?

Adam Hewson

Managing Director - Capital Markets Europe

GE Commercial Finance

THE STATE OF THE MARKET

The Mezzanine market in 2005 has been characterised by further increases in leverage, decreases in spreads, and an almost total absence of warrants in large buyouts.  The high market growth has continued, while second lien issuance has taken off, driven by huge amounts of liquidity from banks, CDOs and hedge funds.  Has the market irrevocably changed or do some of the syndication challanges at the end of 2005 demonstrate some return to normality?

Moderator:

Adam Hewson

Managing Director -Capital Markets Europe

GE Commercial Finance

Speakers:

Robin Doumar

Managing Partner, Park Square Capital LLP

Edward Lewis

Senior Managing Director, CIGNA Investment Management

Paul McKenna

Managing Director, Head European Leveraged Syndicated Finance, ING

2:30 PM – 5:00 PM

SPECIAL SESSION: WHO'S BUYING RISK AND WHAT ARE THEY PAYING?
The mezzanine landscape in Europe has continued to shift, with new threats and opportunities at every turn.  While leverage in buyouts goes up and pricing comes down, who exactly is backing Europe's buyouts, and are they really being properly rewarded?   In a world driven by relative value, do established notions of risk and return still have a role to play? Will subordinated debt market simply change for good, or is it due for a reality check?

2:30 PM - 3:15 PM

PART I:  WHO'S BEEN BACKING EUROPE'S LBOs?

Access to the buyout market, especially at the top end, has become increasingly difficult for traditional mezzanine investors. New investors with lower costs of capital are dominating mezzanine syndicates in place of the established lenders. Are established mezzanine investors continuing to support Europe's LBO market, and how are they finding value for their own investors?
• Who are the investors behind European's larger mezzanine deals?
• Can traditional mezzanine investors find value in the current pricing frenzy?

• Do the "cost of capital" players hold all the cards in winning business?

• Are PE investors really driven by syndicate composition and a fear of "interventionist" lenders?

Moderator:

Katharine Belsham

Investment Director, Intermediate Capital Group PLC

Speakers:

Guy Davies

Partner, Permira

Julian Entwisle

Managing Director, Lehman Brothers

John Herbert

Head of Acquistion Finance, Lloyds TSB

Nick Petrusic

Director, GSC Partners Europe Limited

3:15 PM - 3:45 PM

NETWORKING REFRESHMENT BREAK

3:45 PM - 4:30PM

PART II: DRIVING THE COST OF CAPITAL:  HOW LOW CAN THEY GO?

Europe's mezzanine facilities are increasingly dominated by new investors whose liability management enables them to drive down their cost of capital.  Are these investors' theories of relative value and risk here for the long-term?  How do established experts in the field of managing cost of capital prosper in the white-hot debt markets?

• How do they market themselves to borrowers?

• How do they find value in a white-hot market?

• When and how will the market find its floor?

• Can they ride out an adverse credit cycle?
• What gross and net returns are being proposed to LPs?

Moderator:

Kirk Harrison

Managing Director – Head of Mezzanine, Barclays Capital

Speakers:

Lemy Gresh

Chief Executive Officer, MezzVest

Xavier Lepine

Director, Citadel Investment Group Europe Ltd

David Wilmot

Managing Director, Babson Capital Europe

4:30 PM - 5:00 PM

PART III: MULTI-LAYERED, GLOBAL PLATFORM CASE STUDY

• The use of second lien alongside mezzanine.

• How new supply-side people interact with the deal.

• Repairing problems during syndication or post.

Nick Fenn

Head of LBO Loans & Mezzanine, Mizuho Corporate Bank

CONTINENTAL BREAKFAST

THE IMPACT OF GLOBAL PLATFORMS

In 2005, the European mezzanine market saw an unprecedented number of significant market entries from overseas firms operating via global platforms. Why are they here now? Is this a new trend or just a niche market?  How do they intend to seek value from an already over-supplied market?

• What makes the European market so attractive?

• Do US funding models such as the BDC structure work in Europe?

• Can US investors break into deals through anything other than price?

• What can they bring to the market?

Moderator:

Tim Cottrell

Head of Leveraged Loan Sydication, HVB

Speakers:

Nathalie Faure Beaulieu

Managing Director, European Capital Financial Services Ltd

Louis Lavoie

Managing Director, TCW / Crescent Mazzanine

Niels C. A. Lorijn

Director, CapitalSource Europe Ltd.

SECOND LIEN & THE SHIFT TO MULTI-LAYERED INVESTMENTS

Second lien issuance jumped significantly in 2005, often at the expense of mezzanine.  Many in the market remain unsure about whether it represents expensive senior or cheap mezzanine or whether it should sit in the risk-reward spectrum?

• What exactly are the instruments key credit qualities?

• How is a second lien layer likely to behave in a restucturing?

• Who are the core constituents?

• Will mezzanine investors invest behind second lien?

• Is it really here to stay, or a passing fad?

• Why are arrangers so keen to propose multi-layer structuring?

Moderator:

Nigel Ward

Head of International Finance, Ashurst

Speakers:

Simon Richards

Senior Fund Manager, RAB Capital plc

John Sullivan

Founding Partner, Cognis Capital Partner LLP

10:00 AM - 10:30 AM

NETWORKING REFRESHMENT BREAK

10:30 AM - 11:15 AM

PREMIER OF THE 2006 VCM/CEPRES MEZZANINE DATABASE

Dr Matthias Unser of VCM Capital Management reports the latest CEPRES mezzanine data, a groundbreaking and increasingly comprehensive source of mezzanine returns data across the European and US markets.

Dr. Matthias Unser, CFA

Managing Director, VCM Capital Management

TRENDS IN LARGER TRANSACTIONS

Standard & Poor's presents trends in the mezzanine market, including how the growth explosion in the senior markets have effected associated mezzanine transactions in regard to credit quality, pricing and credit statistics (leverage ratios, interest coverage).

Sucheet Gupte

Associate Director, Standard & Poor’s Leveraged Commentary & Data

11:15 AM - 12:15 PM

INSTITUTIONAL INVESTORS SPEAK OUT

Using the CEPRES return data as their guide, leading mezzanine LPs will seek to determine whether the increasing transparency of mezzanine market returns will lead to greater institutional allocations to the asset class and to analyze how mezzanine asset returns work through different fund structures.

• What should investors and intermediaries take from the return data?

• Can mezzanine still lay claim to being fundamentally "risk-adjusted"?

• How mezzanine returns work through different funding structures (LP or leveraged).

Moderator:

Alexander Bance

Director, Corporate Finance, Private Funds Group, JPMorgan Casenove

Speakers:

Tom Clausen

Managing Partner, CAPVENT

Pascal Feucher

Investment Manager, Quartilium Mezzanine

Rene Biner

Partner, Partners Group

David Lindstrom
Director, MetLife Investmets Limited

LUNCHEON AT THE SAVOY

REFRESHMENT / NETWORKING BREAK

3:00 PM - 3:55 PM

IS THE EUROPEAN MIDDLE MARKET A HAVEN FROM COMMODITISATION?

Below the heat of the large cap battle, middle market mezzanine investors are endeavoring to find value by investing below the EUR50m size range, in a space where mezzanine has yet to become commoditised.  Has this market remained as insulated as its participants hope?  Can something like the bedrock of middle market corporate debt that exists in the US be established across Europe?
• What are the challenges for originating smaller deals?

• What does the European middle market mean in credit and sponsor quality?

• Is pricing and risk/return really better in the middle market?

• How can mezzanine funds continue to differentiate themselves from the banks?

Moderator:

Richard Collins

Director, Indigo Capital Limited

Speakers:

Olivier Bossan

General Partner, IDI Mezzanine

Patrick De Muynck

Partner, EQT Mezzanine

Vesa Suurmunne

Chief Executive, Nordic Mezzanine

James Davis

Investment Director, Intermediate Capital Group PLC

5:15 PM