Moody's affirms Itochu ratings

Moody's Investors Service said it has affirmed its Ba1 senior unsecured debt rating for Itochu Corp. and Ba2 senior unsecured debt ratings for its keep-well letter supported subsidiaries.

The outlook is stable.

The rating affirmation is in response to Itochu's announcement on April 2 that it will recognize approximately ¥150 billion in impairment charges for the fiscal year ending March 2004.

Itochu announced that it will recognize about ¥150 billion in impairment charges on its fixed assets including fixed assets for rental, other land holdings, golf courses, and valuation and sales losses on its real estate for sale for the current fiscal year on a consolidated basis.

Under a new Japanese accounting rule effective from the fiscal year ending March 31, 2006, such unrealized losses must be recognized as impairment charges such as when they exceed some 50% of the book value of the underlying assets under Japanese accounting standards. However, Itochu has chosen to conservatively recognize these losses for U.S. GAAP based consolidated results for the current fiscal year through early application of asset-impairment accounting, as well as to apply a more conservative loss recognition standard than required under U.S. GAAP.

Ratings affirmed include Itochu Corp.'s Ba1 senior unsecured debt rating, Itochu Finance (Europe) plc's Ba2 senior unsecured debt rating, and Itochu International Inc.'s Ba2 senior unsecured debt rating.

© 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.