Moody’s might raise Kerneos

Moody's Investors Service said it placed Kerneos Holding Group SAS’ B1 corporate family rating and B1-PD probability of default rating on review for upgrade following its proposed acquisition by Imerys SA (Baa2 stable).

Concurrently, the agency placed its rating on €350 million of senior secured notes (€375 million face amount) due 2021, issued by Kerneos Corporate SAS, a direct subsidiary of the group, on review for upgrade.

The provisional B1 (LGD3) ratings on the proposed €445 million senior secured term loan B maturing 2023 and €60 million senior secured revolving credit facility maturing 2022 are expected to be withdrawn shortly as the refinancing process initiated in November was discontinued.

"The review was prompted by the announcement that Imerys will acquire all issued share capital of Kern Tech 1 SA, an indirect holding company of Kerneos. The review for upgrade of Kerneos' ratings considers the potential strengthening of the group's credit profile once the transaction becomes effective and it is integrated into the substantially larger, financially stronger and more diversified Imerys group," Goetz Grossmann, Moody's lead analyst for Kerneos, said in a news release.

© 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.