Rolls-Royce has signed a five-year term loan facility, supported by a partial guarantee from UK Export Finance (UKEF).

The £2bn deal, which has not yet been drawn, was jointly led and backed by JP Morgan, Citi, HSBC and Crédit Agricole. The amount guaranteed by UKEF has not been disclosed, but GTR has learned that it is likely to be around 80%.

This is the latest transaction to be supported by UKEF under its general export facility (GEF) programme. Announced in March last year, the GEF enables UKEF to support exporters’ overall working capital requirements, rather than linking support to specific export contracts. Most beneficial to exporters with shorter manufacturing cycles, the GEF enables a wider range of exporters to access and benefit from UKEF support.

Last year, Jaguar Land Rover landed a £500mn guarantee under the programme to support a £625mn facility from Barclays, Citi, HSBC, JP Morgan, NatWest and Standard Chartered, marking the first guarantee issued under the GEF initiative.

Rolls-Royce has long benefited from UKEF backing. In 2018, a UKEF guarantee facilitated the UK’s largest single export deal to Israel, in the shape of a Rolls-Royce contract to supply engines for 16 El Al aircraft.

UKEF’s latest annual report, published last month, says that the UK export credit agency supported a growing amount of financing for Rolls-Royce-powered Boeing 787 aircraft in 2019-20, with further support provided for two B787-8 aircraft delivering to El Al, taking the total number of Rolls-Royce-powered Boeing 787 aircraft supported by UKEF across all customers to 18 to date.