NEW YORK (S&P Global Ratings) Aug. 25, 2016--S&P Global Ratings said today that specialty jewelry retailer Signet Jewelers Ltd.'s (BBB-/Stable/A-3) announced plans to issue $625 million of convertible preferred stock and soft second-quarter 2016 results have no impact on our ratings and outlook. Signet plans to use the net proceeds from the preferred stock offering to repurchase common shares. In our calculation of credit metrics, we treat the preferred stock as debt because it does not meet our criteria requirements for equity credit including the longevity test versus the shorter-term nature of the instrument. We estimate pro forma leverage of 2.7x at July 30, 2016, declining slightly to 2.6x at fiscal year-end 2016 which is still in line with our
