CHICAGO New York Times Co. debt is no longer investment grade, Standard & Poor's Ratings Services asserted late Thursday as it lowered the publisher's credit rating three notches.
The downgrade took Times Co. into junk territory with a BB- rating on both its corporate credit rating and its unsecured debt issues. S&P had rated both as BBB-, its minimum investment-grade rating.
S&P also assigned a recovery rate of 4 to Times debt, indicating lenders can expect to recover 30 cents to 50 cents on the dollar in the event of a payment default.
And the ratings firm slapped a negative outlook on the company, suggesting further downgrades are possible.
S&P's action came on the same day that Moody's Investors Services warned that it had put Times Co. unsecured debt on review for a possible downgrade. Moody's ranks Times debt at its lowest investment-grade rating.
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003877601I would like to be the first to say:
HA!Maybe if they were to print real news, like Obama stealing votes and taking illegal donations, crashing the economy and intimidating dissenters people would read their recycled toilet tissue.