S&P revises Atos view to stable

S&P said it revised the outlook on Atos SE to stable from negative and affirmed the BBB+ credit and issue ratings and Atos and its debt.

On Thursday Atos sold 23.9 million Worldline shares (corresponding to 13.1% of Worldline) for about €1.5 billion. Following this transaction, Atos only holds 3.8% in Worldline. S&P expects Atos to use the proceeds to repay debt.

“We expect Atos will keep this remaining stake as long as its €500 million convertible bond, exchangeable into Worldline shares, remains outstanding (until maturity in 2024 at the latest, but, depending on the share price evolution of Worldline, Atos’ debt could potentially decline further before maturity),” said S&P in a press release.

This results in stronger credit ratios, with adjusted debt to EBITDA of 1.7x in 2020, compared with S&P’s previous estimate at 2.4x before the transaction and funds from operations (FFO) to debt at 49% (compared with 34%), the agency said.

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