No surprise - Victoria pulls its bond offering
The AIM quoted flooring group has decided to pull its proposed bond offering and continue with its existing bank facilities. As alluded to in our previous Blog, the financial numbers were hardly encouraging and it certainly looked strange timing for a new debt facility.
Apparently, the indicative pricing for the bond was higher than had been anticipated, such that it did not warrant changing the Group’s debt financing arrangements at this time. Despite reassurances regarding the suggested ratings of BB (stable) and BB- from global ratings agencies Fitch and Standard & Poor’s respectively, the interim financial information was poor. Indeed, pro-forma numbers suggested to us that bond investors were going to demand a hefty coupon to take on the financing risk of this heavily indebted company. The Group confirmed that it is continuing to operate with ‘significant headroom’ with respect to covenants under its…