Acute care hospital operator HCA Inc. has navigated health care reform better than we expected, as well as better than its peers, driving very strong operating results. We think the company's business risk profile has improved, and significant recent EBITDA outperformance versus our forecasts provides the company with greater cushion to pursue its growth objectives while maintaining leverage below 5x over time. As a result, we are raising our corporate credit rating on HCA two notches, to 'BB' from 'B+'. At the same time, HCA is issuing $750 million of senior unsecured notes to refinance maturing debt. We are assigning our 'B+' rating and '6' recovery rating to this debt. Our stable rating outlook reflects our expectation that HCA's financial
