SAN FRANCISCO (Standard&Poor's) April 24, 2013--Standard&Poor's Ratings Services today assigned its 'BBB' issue-level ratings to an aggregate $1.5 billion of proposed 10-year and 30-year notes issued by Cox Communications Inc. , a wholly owned subsidiary of family owned Atlanta-based Cox Enterprises Inc. We expect the company to use proceeds from the sale of the notes, along with cash and other funds, to repay $600 million of Cox Communications' 4.625% notes due June 2013 at maturity and fund a $1.5 billion dividend to parent Cox Enterprises (Cox). As a result, we expect gross leverage to increase by at least $900 million, and fully adjusted debt to EBITDA to rise minimally to around 2.8x to 2.9x, from 2.7x
