A senior lender to the country’s largest radio station owner told The NY Post on Wednesday he would prefer the San Antonio company goes bankrupt than take Pittman’s latest restructuring offer.
The creditor, who is not typically seen as an activist, said his debt, now trading at 73 cents on the dollar, could fetch 90 cents in a bankruptcy.
“The proposal they are making is a non-starter to me,” he said, referring to iHM’s request that he take a haircut on the interest rate, plus wait an additional year to get paid.
The creditor, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said he would rather have a reasonable offer on the table than see the company collapse into bankruptcy — but he would opt for Chapter 11 over the current offer..
The company said in a regulatory filing on Tuesday that it was weighing breaking off talks with holders of $6.3 billion in term loans because they were going so poorly.
Pittman’s troubles in attempting the Herculean restructuring is a challenge for Bain Capital and THL Partners, the private equity firms that own the money-losing radio giant.
“It doesn’t look good,” a second source close to the situation said. “There is a lot of risk.”
iHeart has several hundred million dollars in debt due in December that it can likely meet, while a nearly $1 billion principal payment due in January 2018 is seen as more of a challenge, the creditor said.
An iHeart spokeswoman said she was optimistic talks would end on the right note — and not in Chapter 11.
“We continue to evaluate various opportunities to strengthen our capital structure for the benefit of our stakeholders, and we remain focused on positioning iHeartMedia for long-term growth.”
No comments:
Post a Comment