S&P Afms Rtgs on Cruise Ship's Notes; Off Watch Neg.Business Editors LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Standard & Poor's Sept. 26, 2001-- Standard & Poor's today affirmed af·firm v. af·firmed, af·firm·ing, af·firms v.tr. 1. To declare positively or firmly; maintain to be true. 2. To support or uphold the validity of; confirm. v.intr. its 'BBB-' rating on Cruise Ship Finance Ltd.'s A and B notes and Cruise Ship Finance II Ltd.'s senior notes and removed the ratings from CreditWatch with negative implications, where they had been placed on Sept. 20, 2001. Regarding Cruise Ship Finance Ltd., the rating action reflects the fact that the final payment expected from the supporting party to the deal, Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. (RCL RCL - Reduced Control Language. A simplified job control language for OS360, translated to IBM JCL. "Reduced Control Language for Non- Professional Users", K. Appel in Command Languages, C. Unger ed, N-H 1973. ; BB+/Negative/--), had been received by the issuer on Aug. 31, 2001, before the Sept. 19 lowering of the local and foreign currency ratings on RCL, and thus there is now no further dependancy de·pen·dan·cy n. Variant of dependency. on RCL's credit quality. In its analysis of the consequences of RCL's downgrade Downgrade A negative change in the rating of a security. Notes: For example, an analyst may downgrade a stock from strong buy to buy, or a bond rating agency may downgrade a bond from AAA to AA. for the Cruise Ship Finance II Ltd. transaction, Standard & Poor's took two factors, among others, into consideration. One element is the short residual timespan during which noteholders are exposed to RCL's credit quality. The second is that, should RCL default, Cruise Ship Finance II Ltd.'s noteholders have access to the sale proceeds of a ship, which is the object of the RCL receivable. It is Standard & Poor's view that, taken in isolation, each of the two elements considered would not warrant a difference between Cruise Ship Finance II Ltd.'s rating and RCL's unsecured debt Unsecured debt Debt that does not identify specific assets that the debtholder is entitled to in case of default. rating. Together, however, the elements warrant the higher rating on Cruise Ship Finance II Ltd. Going forward, though, ratings on Cruise Ship Finance II Ltd. may still be affected by changes in RCL's credit quality. Copyright 2001, Standard & Poor's Ratings Services Ratings Service A company, such as Moody's or Standard & Poor's, that rates various debt and preferred stock issues for safety of payment of principal, interest, or dividends. |
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