The three major credit rating agencies have upgraded Ithaca Energy’s (LON: ITH) credit rating following the completion of Ithaca’s business combination with Italian energy company Eni earlier this month.
Fitch Ratings has upgraded Ithaca Energy’s credit rating to BB- from B Flat and improved the issue credit rating on Ithaca Energy’s proposed 2029 senior Notes to BB-/RR4 from B+/RR3.
S&P Global Ratings initiated coverage with a credit rating of BB- and assigned an issue credit rating of BB-/RR4 to the proposed 2029 Senior Notes.
In addition, Moody’s Ratings has upgraded Ithaca Energy’s corporate rating to Ba3 from B1 and concurrently, upgraded the proposed 2029 Senior Notes to B1 from B3.
All ratings have been assigned stable outlooks.
Chief financial officer of Ithaca Energy Iain Lewis said: “In line with previous expectations shared by the group, we were delighted to receive ratings upgrades yesterday following the successful conclusion of our Business Combination with Eni UK.”
Ithaca Energy’s business combination Eni saw it take over the vast majority of the company’s UK upstream oil and gas assets, excluding those located in the East Irish Sea assets and Eni’s CCUS activities.
The combination was funded by issuing additional shares to Eni UK so that it controlled 38.7% of the new company, with Ithaca controlling the remaining share of the combined group.
The combination brought changes to the board, including the formal appointment of Luciano Vasques as CEO along with two new non-executive directors to its board of directors.
The combined group was previously expected to have a market capitalisation of around £2 billion.
The combined Ithaca Energy and Eni will have daily production of 100,000 – 110,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day, with ambitions of 150,000 per day by the early 2030s.
This makes it the second-largest independent operator in the North Sea based on 2024 production levels.
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