Standard & Poor's cut SoftBank Corp's debt rating two notches to "junk" grade, citing financial risks from its $21.6 billion purchase of U.S. wireless carrier Sprint Nextel Corp and Sprint's proposed takeover of Clearwire Corp.The downgrade spurred a slide in SoftBank's shares, but analysts said the drop was largely due to profit-taking after the stock had surged in anticipation of the Sprint deal, which received final regulatory approval on Friday.S&P had warned in March it would cut SoftBank's rating to BB+, its highest non-investment grade, if the Sprint deal was concluded.The downgrade is unlikely to increase financing costs for SoftBank, which should be able to rely on funding from Japanese banks, said Hiroshi Yamashina, senior telecoms analyst at BNP Paribas in Tokyo.
Sprint Nextel Corporation (Sprint) is a holding company, with its operations primarily conducted by its subsidiaries. Shares of S fell by 0.42% or $-0.03/share to $7.16. In the past year, the shares have traded as low as $3.15 and as high as $7.50. On average, 68409696 shares of S exchange hands on a given day and today's volume is recorded at 36936636.
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