It was one lousy day for CanWest Global Communications.
Regulators denied Canadian television stations the right to charge cable and satellite carriers for their signals, a move that would have been worth nearly $300-million to the broadcast industry.
And CanWest learned Moody's is reviewing its credit ratings, no small issue for a company with $3.6-billion in debt.
Moody's is contemplating downgrades of CanWest Media because “it is also more likely that financial covenant measures will deteriorate and that liquidity will be stressed.”
“Moody's also believes that it is more likely that Canwest will have to sell assets in order to address 2010/2011 refinancing milestones related to last year's acquisition of the former Alliance Atlantis' specialty television operations, and that the related divestiture proceeds will be below earlier expectations,” said the credit rating agency. Analysts have been expressing much the same downbeat view.
