Ford (F) Gets Back Its Investment Grade Rating and the Ford Blue Oval
Tweet Send to a Friend
Get Alerts F Hot Sheet
Down)
Trade F Now!
After years of restructuring its balance sheet, Ford (NYSE: F) got back its investment grade rating at Moody's Tuesday and with it the Blue Oval logo, which the automaker mortgaged in the past.
Moody's Investors Service said Tuesday afternoon that it raised the senior unsecured ratings of Ford Motor Company to Baa3 from Ba2 and Ford Motor Credit Company LLC (Ford Credit) to Baa3 from Ba1.
"The upgrade of Ford recognizes the strength of the company's position in North America, its robust liquidity position, and our expectation that the company will continue to embrace sound operating and financial disciplines," Moody's said. "We believe that these strengths will enable Ford to maintain an investment grade profile in the face of the sector's ongoing cyclicality and weakness in the European market."
The upgrade, the second since April, releases all pledge collateral including Ford Blue Oval.
In 2006, Ford pledged the Ford Blue Oval along with other domestic assets to secure $23.5 billion in liquidity, consisting of $18.5 billion of senior secured debt and credit facilities and $5 billion of unsecured convertible debt.
The liquidity provided by those loans allowed the company to revamp its vehicle line-up and return to profitability. Ford was the the only Big 3 U.S. automaker not to get a government bailout during the credit crisis.
"The Ford Blue Oval is back where it belongs with the Ford family of 166,000 employees around the world," said Chairman Bill Ford. "This is a great day for us and is the result of several years of hard work and progress by everyone associated with Ford."
Join StreetInsider.com FREE and get immediately alerted when news breaks on your stocks and other market items - JOIN NOW
*NEW - Download StreetInsider's FREE iPhone and iPad App - Click Here
Moody's Investors Service said Tuesday afternoon that it raised the senior unsecured ratings of Ford Motor Company to Baa3 from Ba2 and Ford Motor Credit Company LLC (Ford Credit) to Baa3 from Ba1.
"The upgrade of Ford recognizes the strength of the company's position in North America, its robust liquidity position, and our expectation that the company will continue to embrace sound operating and financial disciplines," Moody's said. "We believe that these strengths will enable Ford to maintain an investment grade profile in the face of the sector's ongoing cyclicality and weakness in the European market."
The upgrade, the second since April, releases all pledge collateral including Ford Blue Oval.
In 2006, Ford pledged the Ford Blue Oval along with other domestic assets to secure $23.5 billion in liquidity, consisting of $18.5 billion of senior secured debt and credit facilities and $5 billion of unsecured convertible debt.
The liquidity provided by those loans allowed the company to revamp its vehicle line-up and return to profitability. Ford was the the only Big 3 U.S. automaker not to get a government bailout during the credit crisis.
"The Ford Blue Oval is back where it belongs with the Ford family of 166,000 employees around the world," said Chairman Bill Ford. "This is a great day for us and is the result of several years of hard work and progress by everyone associated with Ford."
Join StreetInsider.com FREE and get immediately alerted when news breaks on your stocks and other market items - JOIN NOW
*NEW - Download StreetInsider's FREE iPhone and iPad App - Click Here
You May Also Be Interested In
- Ford Fusion Energi Earns Top Vehicle Safety Rating from NHTSA
- Berkshire Hathaway (BRK-A) Cut to 'AA' From 'AA+' by S&P
- OSI Systems (OSIS) Unit Issued Notice of Proposed Debarment from U.S. DHS
Create E-mail Alert Related Categories
Corporate News, Credit RatingsRelated Entities
Moody's Investors ServiceComments
Team work
Hopefully unions will continue to collaborate in this excellent progress too. With improved car quality, Ford is a real winner for short, medium and long-term. Thank you for everybody at this wonderful company!
Login with Facebook
Sign up for StreetInsider Free!
Receive full access to all new and archived articles, unlimited portfolio tracking, e-mail alerts, custom newswires and RSS feeds - and more!
Unions
Michael Calaizzo on May 23, 2012 11:58 AMMark as Spam | Reply to this comment
the Unions ruin everything.