Bulletin: Community Health Systems Inc.'s Fourth-Quarter Earnings Announcement Does Not Affect Ratings

BOSTON (S&P Global Ratings) Feb. 21, 2017--S&P Global Ratings said today that its ratings on Franklin, Tenn.-based Community Health Systems Inc. (B/Negative/--) are not affected by the company's fourth-quarter earnings announcement. The announced earnings modestly exceeded our expectations, and we view this quarter's sequential improvement in adjusted EBITDA margins and announcement of further asset sales as a credit positive. However, our negative rating outlook continues to reflect our view that some risk remains to the company's strategy to improve margins and reduce the size of its portfolio by using proceeds from asset sales to reduce debt. Community's fourth-quarter operating results were above our expectations, highlighted by meaningful improvements in salary and benefit expense, indicating that management's efforts to reduce costs

...BOSTON (S&P Global Ratings) Feb. 21, 2017--S&P Global Ratings said today that its ratings on Franklin, Tenn.-based Community Health Systems Inc. (B/Negative/--) are not affected by the company's fourth-quarter earnings announcement. The announced earnings modestly exceeded our expectations, and we view this quarter's sequential improvement in adjusted EBITDA margins and announcement of further asset sales as a credit positive. However, our negative rating outlook continues to reflect our view that some risk remains to the company's strategy to improve margins and reduce the size of its portfolio by using proceeds from asset sales to reduce debt. Community's fourth-quarter operating results were above our expectations, highlighted by meaningful improvements in salary and benefit expense, indicating that management's efforts to reduce costs are achieving some success. Community also reported flat adjusted admissions at the 133 hospitals that the company currently plans to retain. This volume...

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