CHICAGO (Standard&Poor's) Feb. 24, 2015--Standard&Poor's Ratings Services today assigned its 'A' debt rating to Dallas-based Kimberly-Clark Corp.'s (KMB) proposed debt issuance, which we expect will total up to $500 million and consist of a mix of five-year and ten-year fixed-rate senior unsecured notes. The offering will be drawn off Kimberly-Clark's Rule 415 shelf registration statement filed June 27, 2013. We expect the company to use the net proceeds for general corporate purposes, including funding a contribution to its U.S. pension plan totaling between $400 million and $475 million. Pro forma for the proposed debt issuance and recently announced pension settlement agreement, we estimate leverage is about 1.9x and funds from operations (FFO) to debt around 37%.
