S&P Just Downgraded 10 Of The Biggest US Energy Companies
The full release is below:
Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services said today that it has taken rating actions on 20 investment-grade U.S. oil and gas exploration and production (E&P) companies after completing a review. The review followed the recent revision of our hydrocarbon price assumptions (see “S&P Lowers its Hydrocarbon Price Assumptions On Market Oversupply; Recovery Price Deck Assumptions Also Lowered,” published Jan. 12, 2016).
While oil prices deteriorated over the past 15 months, the U.S.-based investment-grade companies we rate had been largely immune to downgrades. However, given the magnitude of the recent reductions in our price deck, most of the investment-grade companies were affected during this review. We expect that many of these companies will continue to lower capital spending and focus on efficiencies and drilling core properties. However, these actions, for the most part, are insufficient to stem the meaningful deterioration expected in
credit measures over the next few years.
A list of rating actions on the affected companies follows.
DOWNGRADES
Chevron Corp. Corporate Credit Rating Lowered To AA-/Stable/A-1+ From AA/Negative/A-1+
The downgrade reflects our expectation that in the context of lower oil and gas prices and refining margins, the company’s credit measures will be below our expectations for the ‘AA’ rating over the next two years. We anticipate Chevron will significantly outspend internally generated cash flow to fund major project capital spending and dividends this year and generate little cash available for debt reduction over the following two years.
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