The unsourced report said Wesfarmers had been negotiating fresh terms with around two-thirds of its lenders, with banks in the financing syndicate warned they would not be appointed in a future equity issue unless they rolled over existing loans to Wesfarmers for another year, “a condition which they are believed to have agreed”

Banks that finance Wesfarmers include the Royal Bank of Scotland, Deutsche Bank, Macquarie Group, Goldman Sachs JBWere, JPMorgan Chase and UBS.

The report also said key relationship banks of Wesfarmers, including the four Australian major banks, were “thought to be in the process of signing up to new refinancing terms”.

Wesfarmers, which has a market capitalisation of around $A10.77 billion, used finance to help secure the $A18 billion takeover of Australian supermarket chain and retail giant Coles Group in 2007.

Meanwhile, Wesfarmers’ coal mining revenue is expected to fall this year in line with the commodities downturn that has been triggered by the ongoing financial crisis.

Shares in the company were up 2.5% today to $A16.63.