[JAKARTA] Indonesia’s state-owned oil giant Pertamina and its shipping arm are seeking an offshore loan of about US$700 million for the construction of vessels, according to people familiar with the matter.
Pertamina sent a request for proposals to banks for the loan in recent weeks, seeking a tenor of around ten years, the people said, who asked not to be named discussing private matters. The company and Pertamina International Shipping will be the borrowers of the proposed facility, they added.
Discussions with lenders are preliminary and the deal’s details could change, the people said. Pertamina International Shipping is seeking funds to support its fleet investment plan to strengthen its logistic services and boost business growth, said Muhammad Baron, PIS’ company secretary to Bloomberg News when asked about the loan, without elaborating further.
Indonesia’s financial markets bounced back recently after a torrid few months, with global funds snapping up US$1.5 billion of government bonds in May, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The country’s offshore syndicated loans also took off in recent weeks, potentially marking a comeback after a period of muted activity.
Sovereign wealth fund Danantara recently sent a request for proposals to banks for a multicurrency borrowing of as much as US$10 billion, in what could be South-east Asia’s largest loan. Meanwhile, Indonesia’s Ministry of Finance is marketing a 252.8-million euro (S$379.2 million) facility, a rare instance of the government body tapping the syndicated market.
The Pertamina loan comes as Indonesian authorities investigate a US$12 billion corruption probe involving the oil giant. In May, Indonesian authorities contacted a number of Singapore-based trading companies to request their cooperation, and executives from Pertamina subsidiaries were arrested in February.
The volume of loans denominated in US dollars, euro and the Japanese yen – also known as G3 currencies – from Indonesia slumped 27 per cent to US$3.9 billion so far in 2025 versus the same period last year, according to Bloomberg-compiled data.
Pertamina International Shipping last raised a US$185 million syndicated loan in February 2023. Meanwhile, the group’s upstream unit Pertamina Hulu Energi last week signed a US$1.2 billion revolving credit facility. BLOOMBERG
