Cox Communications Inc.'s Proposed Unsecured Notes Rated 'BBB'

NEW YORK (S&P Global Ratings) Sept. 10, 2020—S&P Global Ratings today assigned its 'BBB' issue-level rating to Cox Communications Inc.'s proposed unsecured notes due 2030 and 2050, in-line with the issuer credit rating on parent Cox Enterprises Inc. because this debt ranks equally with other existing debt. The company will use proceeds for general corporate purposes, which we expect will include repayment of existing debt. Our 'BBB' issuer credit rating on Cox Enterprises is unaffected by this leverage-neutral transaction. We have updated our forecast to reflect improving automotive market conditions, such that we now expect at least $500 million in EBITDA to be generated by this segment in 2020 compared with our June 2020 forecast of $0 (2019 EBITDA was

...September 10, 2020 NEW YORK (S&P Global Ratings) Sept. 10, 2020--S&P Global Ratings today assigned its '###' issue-level rating to Cox Communications Inc.'s proposed unsecured notes due 2030 and 2050, in-line with the issuer credit rating on parent Cox Enterprises Inc. because this debt ranks equally with other existing debt. The company will use proceeds for general corporate purposes, which we expect will include repayment of existing debt. Our '###' issuer credit rating on Cox Enterprises is unaffected by this leverage-neutral transaction. We have updated our forecast to reflect improving automotive market conditions, such that we now expect at least $500 million in EBITDA to be generated by this segment in 2020 compared with our June 2020 forecast of $0 (2019 EBITDA was around $1.2 billion). Therefore, we now project debt to EBITDA of around 2.5x at the end of 2020 falling to around 2x in 2021 due to total EBITDA growth of 6%-8% as the cable business continues to benefit from strong...

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