...November 8, 2022 TORONTO (S&P Global Ratings) Nov. 8, 2022--S&P Global Ratings today said it views Lightstone HoldCo LLC's (B-/Stable/--) announced Dutch auction-style prepayment offer to purchase up to $85 million of its outstanding secured term loan B/C debt obligations as opportunistic. The company will use cash from operations to prepay an incremental percentage equal to the discount to par. Our ratings on Lightstone and liquidity assessment of adequate remain unchanged. S&P Global Ratings uses market cues, among other factors, to make such determinations as opportunistic or distressed. Furthermore, the long-dated nature of the debt supports our view that this transaction is opportunistic, not distressed. If the offer is not accepted, the company is not at risk of a conventional default on these instruments over the next few years. However, we could view future loan repurchases as distressed exchanges if the company purchased debt at a significant discount to par and there was a realistic...
