Standard & Poor’s has downgraded the credit rating of Rocky Mountain News owner E.W. Scripps Co. following the recent separation of Scripps’ newspaper and broadcast television business from its cable and online division.
S&P dropped the debt rating five notches from “A,” an investment grade, to the junk-bond category of “BB+.”
“The downgrade of the long-term rating was based on the company’s weakened business profile and narrower diversification” following the spinoff, S&P said in a ratings report. “The ‘BB+’ rating reflected the company’s less diversified business mix, which is now more reliant on the declining newspaper business and on a relatively small broadcast TV business that is less profitable than its peers.”
In association with the July 9 downgrade, Scripps requested that the rating be withdrawn, meaning S&P will no longer issue credit ratings for the firm.
