PrefBlog

Standard & Poor’s has announced:

• In the weaker macroeconomic environment we anticipate, in large part because of the COVID-19 outbreak, Bombardier Inc.’s capital structure appears to be unsustainable in the long term.
• As a result, S&P Global Ratings lowered its ratings on Bombardier by one notch, including its issuer credit rating on the company to ‘CCC+’ from ‘B-‘.
• At present, we don’t believe Bombardier will face a near-term liquidity crisis given the ample cash on its balance sheet at the beginning of the year.
• The negative outlook reflects the possibility of another downgrade if macroeconomic conditions further deteriorate from our expectations leading to our view that Bombardier is likely to consider a distressed exchange offer or sub-par redemption in the near term.

…
In our Feb. 19, 2020, research update on Bombardier, we were expecting S&P Global Ratings’ adjusted debt-to-EBITDA of 6x-7x in 2021. However, we now believe leverage is likely to be higher given our view that earnings and free cash flow prospects for the company’s business jet division have deteriorated, at least over the next couple of years. While we recognize that large cabin business jets, which will make up the majority of Bombardier’s sales in future will see less downward pressure than small cabin jets, we expect demand will be lower than previously expected. Given Bombardier’s high debt load and our expectation for lower earnings and free cash flow generation, we Bombardier’s financial commitments appear unsustainable in the long term. We acknowledge that our forecast is highly uncertain at this time and the company has yet to provide updated guidance.

The negative outlook reflects our view that Bombardier could pursue a distressed exchange or other debt restructuring in the next 12 months to reduce its debt obligations, which we consider unsustainable in the long-term. In our view, key risks include weaker-than-expected demand from a global recession, and operating disruptions that could lead to a meaningful free cash flow deficit.

We could lower our rating on Bombardier if the company announces a distressed exchange or we consider such an event to be highly likely. This could occur if macroeconomic conditions further deteriorate from our expectations, contributing to a weaker outlook for business jet demand, and a large free cash flow deficit. It could also occur if we believe the acquisition of the company’s Bombardier Transportation (BT) segment by Alstom S.A. is unlikely to close as proposed.

We could revise the outlook to stable if we see a lower likelihood that Bombardier could pursue a distressed exchange or debt restructuring in the next twelve months. This could be the case if we expect a strong recovery in the second half of this year, leading us to believe that Bombardier’s capital structure is sustainable in the long-term.

The rating on these preferreds is now so low that S&P doesn’t offer a ‘Canadian National Scale’ equivalent with a “P” prefix … all the preferreds get is a straight transcription to CC.

Affected issues are BBD.PR.B, BBD.PR.C and BBD.PR.D.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 24th, 2020 at 10:41 pm and is filed under Issue Comments. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.