Moody’s says Canadian companies’ refinancing risks are dropping

Thanks to a decrease in the amount of debt maturing over the next couple of years, refinancing risk in Canada is declining too, Moody’s Investors Service reports.

In a new report, the rating agency said that Canadian non-financial companies have about $92 billion (all figures in U.S. dollars) of debt maturing in the 2020 – 2024 period, which is down by about 5% from the previous period (2019 to 2023).

Moody’s noted that this is the lowest quantity of maturing debt since 2017.

“The decrease in the amount of Canadian rated debt maturing between 2020 and 2024 was driven by a 7% drop in speculative-grade bond maturities and a 5% drop in investment-grade bond maturities,” Paresh Chari, vice president and senior analyst at Moody’s, said in a statement.

“The change reflects higher speculative-grade debt issuance in 2019, which pushed maturities out of our forward-looking five-year window, as well as repayment of debt within the five-year window and rating withdrawals,” he added.

Moody’s reported that speculative-grade issuance doubled in 2019 to $14.5 billion.

Additionally, it said that about 89% of Canadian speculative-grade debt matures in 2022 and beyond, which reduces refinancing risk in 2020 and 2021.

There’s essentially no speculative debt maturing this year, and just $6 billion in 2021, Moody’s said.

Speculative-grade maturities now peak in 2023 at $21 billion, Moody’s reported.

James Langton

James is a senior reporter for Advisor.ca and its sister publication, Investment Executive. He has been reporting on regulation, securities law, industry news and more since 1994.