...- U.S. apparel company VF Corp. announced it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire streetwear company Supreme for $2.1 billion in cash (excluding potential earn-out payments). - VF plans to fund the transaction using some of the proceeds from senior notes it issued in April, along with commercial paper borrowings. - The acquisition will increase VF's leverage and extend its path to reducing leverage back to pre-pandemic levels. We believe leverage could remain over 2x, which is above our downgrade trigger, for an extended period. As a result, we are placing all of our ratings on VF, including our 'A' long-term and 'A-1' short-term issuer credit ratings, on CreditWatch with negative implications. - The CreditWatch placement reflects our expectation that the incremental leverage at VF over the next few years may offset the benefits of the acquisition, and we could lower the rating as a result. We will resolve the CreditWatch placement once we have assessed the acquisition's effect...
