Utilities Group

CFBANQUE Investment confirms the AA rating assigned to Utilities Group (AFR0314.JO), an operator in the Utilities sector based in South Africa. This credit opinion reflects a superior credit quality, reflecting a very strong capacity to honour its financial obligations even under an adverse macroeconomic environment.

From a fundamental standpoint, the issuer posts an EBITDA margin of 56.6% which sits at the upper end of the sector range and evidences robust pricing power and exhibits a contained net leverage of 0.36x EBITDA, providing comfortable headroom to absorb capital expenditure and debt servicing. With revenues of $8.88B and a market capitalisation of $2.57B, Utilities Group commands an established economic footprint within its domestic market.

Our proprietary models assign a Debt Capacity score of 911/1000, an Investment score of 842/1000 and an ESG & Governance score of 610/1000, reflecting a solid debt coverage, an attractive investment potential and ESG standards on a continuous improvement trajectory.

The Stable outlook indicates that our committee does not anticipate, in its central scenario, a revision of the rating over a 12 to 18 month horizon. This analysis stems from the combined review of our quantitative models and the qualitative judgement of the CFBANQUE Investment rating committee, and may be updated in line with the evolution of fundamentals or the regional macroeconomic environment.