The Walt Disney Company sold $1.4 billion in new notes. That’s a relatively routine debt offering for the giant media company and Moody’s Investors Service had given the new issue in two tranches an investment grade A2 rating.
“Proceeds from the issuance will be used for general corporate purposes as well as repayment of the company’s commercial paper borrowings ($607 million at 12/31/2011). The offering will further push out the company’s debt maturities and will not affect the company’s long term-debt ratings as the transaction is not expected to have a material impact on the company’s strong credit metrics. We anticipate the company will continue to manage share repurchases and acquisitions to maintain its credit metrics within the bounds of the A2 rating category,” said Moody’s.
The tranche of $1 billion due February 2017 carries a coupon of 1.125% and sold for 99.04% of par for an effective yield of 1.324%.
The tranche of $400 million due February 2022 carries a coupon of 2.55% and sold for 99.3% of par for an effective yield of 2.63%.
BNP Paribas, Deutsche Bank, HSBC, and JP Morgan were joint bookrunning managers for the debt sale.
