S&P lowers Vantiv, rates loans BB+

Standard & Poor's said it lowered the corporate credit rating on Vantiv LLC to BB from BB+ and removed it from CreditWatch, where it was placed with negative implications May 13 following news of its plan to acquire Mercury Payment Systems for about $1.65 billion in a debt-financed transaction.

The outlook is stable.

S&P also said it assigned BB+ ratings and 2 recovery ratings to the company's incremental $669 million first-lien term loan A due 2019, $1 billion term loan B due 2021 and amended-and-extended $500 million revolving credit facility due 2019.

The agency also said it lowered the rating on the company's existing term loan A due 2018 to BB+ from BBB due to the incremental leverage to be incurred with the Mercury acquisition. S&P also revised the recovery rating to 2 from 1.

The 2 recovery rating on the company's first-lien credit facilities indicates 70% to 90% expected default recovery.

The downgrades reflect Vantiv's increased leverage pro forma for the acquisition of Mercury of about 4.6x, S&P said.

© 2015 Prospect News.
All content on this website is protected by copyright law in the U.S. and elsewhere. For the use of the person downloading only.
Redistribution and copying are prohibited by law without written permission in advance from Prospect News.
Redistribution or copying includes e-mailing, printing multiple copies or any other form of reproduction.