...- U.S.-based creative products retailer The Michaels Cos. Inc.'s persistently soft sales trends are weakening due to lower customer traffic amid a difficult operating environment. - We expect the pace and magnitude of Michaels' performance recovery will be lower than our previous forecast, leaving leverage elevated and free cash generation constrained under the company's heavy debt and interest burden. - Therefore, we lowered our issuer credit rating to '###+' from 'B-'. The outlook is negative. - At the same time, we lowered our issue-level ratings on the company's term loan and senior secured notes to '###+' from 'B-'. The '3' recovery rating is unchanged. We also lowered our issue-level rating on the company's senior unsecured notes to '###-' from '###'. The '6' recovery rating is unchanged. - The negative outlook reflects the risk of a potential downgrade if weak sales trends fail to stabilize, limiting cash generation and pressuring credit metrics causing us to conclude a default scenario...
