Los Angeles-based Ares Management announced the cancellation of its planned merger with Kayne Capital Advisors, an energy-focused asset manager. As a result, we expect Ares to reduce leverage materially by redeeming the $325 million of senior unsecured notes that it issued in August 2015 to fund a portion of the proposed transaction. We are revising our outlook on Ares to positive from stable and affirming our 'BBB+' issuer credit and senior unsecured debt ratings. The positive outlook reflects our expectation that the company will maintain a stronger financial profile, possibly with debt to adjusted EBITDA of less than 1.5x, in the next 12-18 months than we had anticipated under the previously planned merger. On Nov. 5, 2015, Standard&Poor's
