Fitch affirms Gas Natural at 'BBB+'; stable outlook

Fitch affirms Gas Natural at 'BBB+'; stable outlook

Wed Jan 16, 2013 7:17am EST

Jan 16 - Fitch Ratings has affirmed Gas Natural SDG, S.A.'s Long-term Issuer Default Rating (IDR) at 'BBB+' and removed it from Rating Watch Negative (RWN). The Outlook is Stable. A full list of rating actions is below.

The rating actions follow the approval by the Spanish government of a set of measures on 27 December 2012 designed to prevent generation of future tariff deficit (TD) in the electricity system in Spain. The current regulatory scheme presents slight changes compared with the draft measures published in September 2012. The main difference is that a flat 7% tax has been fixed to all power generation compared with the previous proposal of 6%. Fitch does not expect this to have a significant impact on Gas Natural's credit metrics. The other approved measures were largely unchanged.