Showtime’s KIPCO downgraded
Chris Forrester
06-09-2009

Showtime Arabia recently “merged” its Middle East pay-TV business with arch-rival Orbit. It seems the move partly helped drive a ratings downgrade on KIPCO, which is part-owned by a Kuwaiti sovereign fund, and that holds a couple of major local banks in its portfolio.

Kuwait Projects Company Holding (KIPCO) has been downgraded by Moody’s Investors Service from “stable” to “negative” reflecting “deterioration in the credit quality of some of its core subsidiaries,” says Moody’s. The “four core subsidiaries” form the major portions of KIPCO’s business and include United Gulf Bank, Burgan Bank as well as Gulf Insurance Co. “[These] and satellite TV broadcaster Showtime and Orbit currently constitute 78% of the company’s asset base and represent 64% of KIPCO’s cash flows,” says Moody’s.