Terminal 6 at JFK International Airport will likely be financed using non-recourse debt with financial close expected as soon as September.

The estimated cost of the development – in conjunction with airline operator JetBlue – is $4 billion and was greenlighted by New York State and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey (PANYNJ) in August 2021. Lenders are already in place but sources say trying to close it next month "sounds really ambitious".

Alongside trying to project finance the terminal, there is also an equity sell down process under way. 

Terminal 6 opened in 1970 but was later demolished in 2011 after JetBlue shifted to Terminal 5 in 2008. In 2021, PANYNJ reached an agreement with the JFK Millennium Partners (JMP) consortium to develop a new Terminal 6.

The team comprises:

• JetBlue Airways
• Vantage Airport Group
• American Triple I (ATI) – 30%
• RXR Realty

The development was due to commence in 2020 but was hit with delays due to the pandemic. However, PANYNJ and JMP signed a reworked deal for the new terminal development in August 2021 which was subsequently approved.

JMP will build a state-of-the-art new international terminal that will anchor the north side of JFK Airport. The development will also include a US Customs and Border Protection processing facility and significant airside and landside expansions.

The structure will be developed on the former sites of Terminal 6 and ageing Terminal 7 building, the latter of which will be knocked down once British Airways moves to Terminal 8. Terminal 6 will also connect to Terminal 5.

AECOM Hunt is providing design-build services for the project.

In June, MUFG led a group of 6 coordinating lead arrangers on $6.63 billion of facilities for New Terminal One (NTO), the consortium selected to re-develop a terminal at New York's John F Kennedy International Airport.

The financing structure comprised a single 5-year term loan with 2 tranches totaling $6.33 billion as well as a:

• $200 million – liquidity facility
• $50 million – working capital facility
• $50 million – security deposit facility to be borrowed by New York Transportation Development Corporation, a local development corporation, as conduit issuer
• $2.33 billion – sponsor equity (backed by LCs)

The other CLAs alongside MUFG on the deal were:

• HSBC
• ING
• Intesa
• Scotiabank
• SMBC
• Societe Generale

Participant banks were:

• Bank of America
• Citibank
• KDB Asia
• KfW IPEX-Bank
• Korea Development Bank