S&P cuts Washington Post

Standard & Poor's said it lowered the corporate credit and senior unsecured ratings on the Washington Post Co. to A- from A., along with its commercial-paper rating to A-2 from A-1.

The agency also said it removed the ratings from CreditWatch, where they were placed with negative implications in May.

The outlook is negative.

The downgrade reflects a concern that declining revenues and EBITDA will continue in the company's Kaplan higher education business, which currently accounts for about half of consolidated EBITDA, S&P said.

The company's credit quality has relied on the company's mix of education and media businesses, strong profitability, low debt leverage, good discretionary cash flow generation and ample excess liquidity, the agency said.

S&P also said it sees the potential for ongoing erosion of newspaper advertising and circulation revenues.

© 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.