...- Sonoco Products Co. has announced that it intends to acquire Eviosys, a European metal packaging manufacturer, from KPS Capital Partners for $3.9 billion. - Although S&P Global Ratings believes the acquisition fits with the company's core businesses and will strengthen its global position in metal packaging, we expect the transaction will increase its already elevated S&P Global Ratings-adjusted debt leverage. In addition, we do not expect the company will likely improve its leverage below 3x over the 12-24 months following the close of the transaction. - Therefore, we placed all of our ratings on Sonoco, including the '###' issuer credit rating, on CreditWatch with negative implications to reflect the strong likelihood that we will lower our ratings by one notch if the acquisition weakens its financial risk profile over the two years following the transaction. - We expect to resolve the CreditWatch placement upon the completion of the transaction. At that time, we will evaluate the addition...
