Fitch Upgrades TD AMERITRADE Holding Corp Debt to 'BB+'; Affirms IDR at 'BB+'.CHICAGO -- Fitch Ratings Fitch Ratings An international rating agency for financial institutions, insurance companies, and corporate, sovereign, and municipal debt. Fitch Ratings has headquarters in New York and London and is wholly owned by FIMALAC of Paris. upgrades the long-term rating of TD AMERITRADE Holding Corporation's (AMTD AMTD Arithmetic Mean Temperature Difference AMTD Automatic Magnetic Tape Distribution AMTD Affordability and Manufacturing Technology Demonstration ) senior debt term-loan borrowings to 'BB+' from 'BB'. At the same time, the long-term Issuer Default Rating (IDR IDR In currencies, this is the abbreviation for the Indonesian Rupiah. Notes: The currency market, also known as the Foreign Exchange market, is the largest financial market in the world, with a daily average volume of over US $1 trillion. ) is affirmed at 'BB+'. The Rating Outlook remains Positive for both the senior debt and the IDR. TD AMERITRADE Holding Corporation's long-term debt Long-Term Debt Loans and financial obligations lasting over one year. Notes: For example debts obligations such as bonds and notes which have maturities greater than one year would be considered long-term debt. consists of the following: --$250 million term loan A senior secured notes maturing Dec. 31, 2011; --$1.650 billion term loan B senior secured notes maturing Dec. 31, 2012. The rating upgrade on the senior long-term debt is based on TD AMERITRADE's progress in paying down debt according to its schedule. Current debt outstanding is approximately $1.7 billion at Dec. 31, 2006. AMTD paid back approximately $500 million total debt between the date of the acquisition close and fiscal year-end 2006. Fitch cites the reduced leverage as a key reason for the upgrade. At the same time Fitch affirms the IDR rating at 'BB+' because the issuer's probability of default Probability of default (PD) is a parameter used in the calculation of economic capital or regulatory capital under Basel II for a banking institution. This is an attribute of bank's client. profile has not changed radically. AMTD is still in the process of integrating a large acquisition and while revenues and expense synergies appear likely to be met, the company faces challenges in establishing itself as an asset gatherer and diversifying its revenues base to more fee-based. Fitch maintains the Positive Outlook because leverage metrics are improving and because the company is in the process of meeting its established targets. Debt to equity has already declined over 40% since deal close. The Positive Outlook also indicates that continuing to meet synergies and debt reduction targets could merit higher ratings over the intermediate term. Fitch's rating definitions and the terms of use Terms of Use are rules set up by the owner of an intellectual property or service to govern how they may be legally used. In many cases, terms of service are used as a contractual agreement between a company and users of a service they provide. of such ratings are available on the agency's public site, www.fitchratings.com. Published ratings, criteria and methodologies are available from this site, at all times. Fitch's code of conduct, confidentiality, conflicts of interest, affiliate firewall, compliance and other relevant policies and procedures Policies and Procedures are a set of documents that describe an organization's policies for operation and the procedures necessary to fulfill the policies. They are often initiated because of some external requirement, such as environmental compliance or other governmental are also available from the 'Code of Conduct' section of this site. |
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