Fitch Snips Mexican Diaper Producer

Fitch has downgraded Copamex’s senior unsecured foreign and local currency issuer default ratings to B+ from BB minus and the senior unsecured national scale rating to BBB from A minus. The outlook is stable. Fitch says that although management has implemented strategies that have allowed Copamex, the industrial paper and diaper maker, to obtain savings in operating expenses, they have not been enough to maintain the financial indicators in the levels according to the rating category. On December 31, the Mexican corporate reported a ratio of on balance sheet debt net of collaterals to Ebitda of 3.2x, an increase from the 2.9x registered a year ago, the agency says. It also cites the company’s higher refinancing risk, as the company has 45% of total debt maturing in the next nine months amid a credit shortage.