Qatar Telecom QSC (QTEL), which raised $1 billion in bonds this month, still has “substantial headroom” to borrow, Moody’s Investors Service said, six months after warning that more acquisitions could be “credit negative.”
“There is more capacity than we had anticipated in June,” Martin Kohlhase, Dubai-based vice president and senior analyst for Moody’s, said by phone yesterday. “We are comfortable with their position within their rating category.” The second- biggest Arab phone company by revenue known as Qtel is rated A2 at Moody’s, the sixth-highest investment grade.
Moody’s said in June that Qtel’s $1.8 billion investment in Kuwait’s National Mobile Telecommunication Co. (NMTC) would reduce the company’s “liquidity headroom.” The assessment was based on projections showing a higher ratio of debt to EBITDA, or earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortization, than what later transpired, Kohlhase said. “Net debt was reduced faster” than projected, he said.
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