Ferrexpo credit rating raised by Moody’s to B3/Stable

Moody’s raised the corporate family rating of iron ore
miner and pellet maker Ferrexpo (FXPO LN, FXPOLN) to B3 with a Stable outlook
on Dec. 27 following its Dec. 21 sovereign upgrade.

Ferrexpo is rated one notch above Ukraine’s sovereign
level by Moody’s. Ferrexpo’s two other ratings are B/Stable by S&P (one
notch above sovereign) and B+/Stable by Fitch (two notches above sovereign).

Dmytro Khoroshun: After Ferrexpo repays its USD 173 mln Eurobond outstanding on Apr. 7,
2019, which seems a certainty, the company will have no publicly traded debt.
The company underlined to investors recently that, in order to minimize its
refinancing risks, it intends to rely on amortizing bank credits rather than on
bonds with bullet maturities. Therefore, we think that the rating hike will not
impact the markets much.