S&P: A&P unchanged

Standard & Poor's said that the March 13 announcement by The Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Co. Inc. (A&P, B-/Watch negative/B-3) that it had sold some of its holdings in Metro Inc. would not affect the CreditWatch negative listing for the company or for Pathmark Stores Inc. (B-/Watch negative).

A&P said that it sold 6.35 million shares of Metro stock for about $203.5 million, the agency noted, adding that it expects that A&P will use proceeds to finance a portion of its acquisition of Pathmark.

S&P said it views this as positive and it may help to reduce the possibility of a downgrade, adding that though A&P still owns 11.7 million shares of Metro worth around $378 million, the company may sell only a total of 7.1 million shares under the transaction agreement.

© 2015 Prospect News.
All content on this website is protected by copyright law in the U.S. and elsewhere. For the use of the person downloading only.
Redistribution and copying are prohibited by law without written permission in advance from Prospect News.
Redistribution or copying includes e-mailing, printing multiple copies or any other form of reproduction.