Charter Communications, Inc. (NASDAQ: CHTR):
Refinancing and New Capital to Total $3 Billion
Company has $800 Million in Cash and Cash Equivalents
Operations Expected to Continue As Usual
Charter Communications, Inc. (NASDAQ: CHTR) ("Charter,” the "Company”)
and its subsidiaries announced that they have reached an
agreement-in-principle with an ad hoc committee of certain of the
Company’s debt holders on the terms of a financial restructuring to
reduce the Company’s debt by approximately $8 billion. In the context of
its agreement, Charter also announced that two of its subsidiaries, CCH
I Holdings, LLC ("CIH”) and Charter Communications Holdings, LLC
("Charter Holdings”) will make within the allotted grace period,
interest payments totaling approximately $74 million in the aggregate on
certain of their outstanding senior notes that were due January 15, 2009.
"We are pleased to have reached an agreement with such a significant
portion of our bondholders on a long-term solution to improve our
capital structure,” said Neil Smit, President and Chief Executive
Officer. "We are committed to continuing to provide our 5.5 million
customers with quality cable, Internet and phone service, and through
this agreement, we will be even better positioned to deliver the
products and services our customers demand now and in the future.
Moreover, the interest and support provided by our stakeholders with
their new capital investment underscores their confidence in Charter and
our business.”
Charter’s operations are strong and the Company remains focused on
continuing to provide its customers with quality service and support
today and going forward. Preliminary fourth quarter 2008 results reflect pro
forma1
revenue growth of approximately 7% and pro-forma
adjusted EBITDA2 growth of more than 10%, on a
year-over-year basis. As of February 11, Charter had approximately $800
million in cash and cash equivalents available to it. Charter believes
its liquidity, combined with its cash from operating activities, will be
sufficient to meet its projected cash needs, including the payment of
normal operating costs and expenses, as it proceeds with its financial
restructuring.
The funding required by the financial restructuring contemplated by the
agreement-in-principle is expected to be satisfied by cash on hand, an
exchange of debt of CCH II, LLC ("CCH II”) and CCH I, LLC ("CCH I”) for
new notes issued by CCH II, the issuance of additional debt, and the
proceeds of an equity offering for which the Company has received a
back-stop commitment from certain of its noteholders. The agreement
further contemplates that (i) the notes and bank debt of Charter
Communications Operating, LLC and CCO Holdings, LLC will remain
outstanding, (ii) holders of notes issued by CCH II will receive new
notes issued by CCH II or cash on account of their claims, (iii) holders
of notes issued by CCH I will receive the new notes issued by CCH II and
shares of common stock in Charter (iv) holders of notes issued by CIH
will receive warrants to purchase shares of common stock in Charter (v)
holders of notes of Charter Holdings will receive warrants to purchase
shares of common stock of Charter, (vi) holders of convertible notes
issued by Charter will receive cash and preferred stock issued by
Charter, and (vii) holders of common stock will not receive any amounts
on account of their common stock, which will be cancelled. In addition,
as part of the financial restructuring, it is expected that
consideration will be paid by CCH I noteholders to other entities
participating in the financial restructuring. As part of the agreement,
Paul Allen will continue as an investor, and will retain the largest
voting interest in the Company.
The agreement-in-principle is subject to numerous closing conditions and
there is no assurance that the treatment of creditors outlined above
will not change significantly. Under the terms of the agreement, the
Company intends to implement its financial restructuring through a
Chapter 11 filing to be initiated on or before April 1, 2009. The
purpose of Charter’s financial restructuring is to strengthen its
balance sheet in order to fully support the Company’s operations and
service its debt. As such, the agreement-in-principle contemplates
paying trade creditors in full.
Important Note
The transaction described above is subject to numerous closing
conditions and is not an offer to sell securities or a solicitation of
an offer to purchase any securities. Any securities to be issued
pursuant to the backstop commitment described above and the new CCH II
notes issued to the ad-hoc committee of noteholders will be issued
pursuant to an exemption under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended.
The Company issued a separate release today announcing preliminary
results for the quarter and year ended December 31, 2008.
Notably, the agreement-in-principle contains an agreement by the parties
that the Company shall not be required to comply with any terms if such
compliance would trigger a default under one or more of the debt
instruments to remain outstanding. All of the summaries of the
provisions of the agreement-in-principle are qualified entirely by the
terms in the definitive documentation.
About Charter Communications
Charter Communications, Inc. is a leading broadband communications
company and the third-largest publicly traded cable operator in the
United States. Charter provides a full range of advanced broadband
services, including advanced Charter Digital Cable(R) video
entertainment programming, Charter High-Speed(R) Internet access, and
Charter Telephone(R). Charter Business(TM) similarly provides scalable,
tailored, and cost-effective broadband communications solutions to
business organizations, such as business-to-business Internet access,
data networking, video and music entertainment services, and business
telephone. Charter's advertising sales and production services are sold
under the Charter Media(R) brand. More information about Charter can be
found at www.charter.com.
Use of Non-GAAP Financial Metrics
The Company uses certain measures that are not defined by Generally
Accepted Accounting Principles ("GAAP”) to evaluate various aspects of
its business. We have provided pro forma results in this release
for the three months ended December 31, 2008. We believe these pro
forma results facilitate meaningful analysis of the results of
operations. Pro forma results in this release reflect certain
sales and acquisitions of cable systems in 2008 and 2007 as if they had
occurred as of January 1, 2007.
Pro forma adjusted EBITDA is a non-GAAP financial measure and
should be considered in addition to, not as a substitute for, net cash
flows from operating activities reported in accordance with GAAP. These
terms, as defined by Charter, may not be comparable to similarly titled
measures used by other companies. Adjusted EBITDA is defined as income
from operations before depreciation and amortization, impairment
charges, stock compensation expense, and other operating expenses, such
as special charges and loss on sale or retirement of assets. As such, it
eliminates the significant non-cash depreciation and amortization
expense that results from the capital-intensive nature of the Company’s
businesses as well as other non-cash or non-recurring items, and is
unaffected by the Company’s capital structure or investment activities.
Adjusted EBITDA and pro forma adjusted EBITDA are liquidity
measures used by Company management and its board of directors to
measure the Company’s ability to fund operations and its financing
obligations. For this reason, it is a significant component of Charter’s
annual incentive compensation program. However, this measure is limited
in that it does not reflect the periodic costs of certain capitalized
tangible and intangible assets used in generating revenues and the cash
cost of financing for the Company. Company management evaluates these
costs through other financial measures.
The Company believes that pro forma adjusted EBITDA provides
information useful to investors in assessing Charter’s ability to
service its debt, fund operations, and make additional investments with
internally generated funds. In addition, adjusted EBITDA generally
correlates to the leverage ratio calculation under the Company’s credit
facilities or outstanding notes to determine compliance with the
covenants contained in the facilities and notes (all such documents have
been previously filed with the United States Securities and Exchange
Commission). Pro forma adjusted EBITDA, as presented, include
management fee expenses in the amount of $32 million and $31 million for
the three months ended December 31, 2008 and 2007, respectively, which
expense amounts are excluded for the purposes of calculating compliance
with leverage covenants.
Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Statements:
This release includes forward-looking statements within the meaning of
Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E
of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, regarding, among
other things, our plans, strategies and prospects, both business and
financial. Although we believe that our plans, intentions and
expectations reflected in or suggested by these forward-looking
statements are reasonable, we cannot assure you that we will achieve or
realize these plans, intentions or expectations. Forward-looking
statements are inherently subject to risks, uncertainties and
assumptions including, without limitation, the factors described under
"Risk Factors" from time to time in our filings with the Securities and
Exchange Commission ("SEC"). Many of the forward-looking statements
contained in this release may be identified by the use of
forward-looking words such as "believe," "expect," "anticipate,"
"should," "plans," "will," "may," "intend," "estimated," "aim," "on
track," "target," "opportunity" and "potential," among others. Important
factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the
forward-looking statements we make in this release are set forth in
other reports or documents that we file from time to time with the SEC,
including our quarterly reports on Form 10-Q filed in 2008 and our most
recent annual report on Form 10-K and include, but are not limited to:
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the outcome of our discussions with our bondholders and the completion
of the Company's announced restructuring including the outcome and
impact on our business of any resulting proceedings under Chapter 11
of the Bankruptcy Code;
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the availability and access, in general, of funds to meet interest
payment obligations under our debt and to fund our operations and
necessary capital expenditures, either through cash on hand, cash
flows from operating activities, further borrowings or other sources
and, in particular, our ability to fund debt obligations (by dividend,
investment or otherwise) to the applicable obligor of such debt;
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our ability to comply with all covenants in our indentures and credit
facilities, any violation of which, if not cured in a timely manner,
could trigger a default of our other obligations under cross-default
provisions;
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our ability to repay debt prior to or when it becomes due and/or
successfully access the capital or credit markets to refinance that
debt through new issuances, exchange offers or otherwise, including
restructuring our balance sheet and leverage position, especially
given recent volatility and disruption in the capital and credit
markets;
-
the impact of competition from other distributors, including incumbent
telephone companies, direct broadcast satellite operators, wireless
broadband providers, and digital subscriber line ("DSL") providers;
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difficulties in growing, further introducing, and operating our
telephone services, while adequately meeting customer expectations for
the reliability of voice services;
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our ability to adequately meet demand for installations and customer
service;
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our ability to sustain and grow revenues and cash flows from operating
activities by offering video, high-speed Internet, telephone and other
services, and to maintain and grow our customer base, particularly in
the face of increasingly aggressive competition;
-
our ability to obtain programming at reasonable prices or to
adequately raise prices to offset the effects of higher programming
costs;
-
general business conditions, economic uncertainty or downturn,
including the recent volatility and disruption in the capital and
credit markets and the significant downturn in the housing sector and
overall economy; and
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the effects of governmental regulation on our business.
All forward-looking statements attributable to us or any person acting
on our behalf are expressly qualified in their entirety by this
cautionary statement. We are under no duty or obligation to update any
of the forward-looking statements after the date of this release.
1 Pro forma results are described below in the "Use of
Non-GAAP Financial Metrics” section of this news release.
2 Adjusted EBITDA is defined in the "Use of Non-GAAP
Financial Metrics” section and is reconciled to net cash flows from
operating activities in the addendum of this news release.
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CHARTER COMMUNICATIONS, INC. AND SUBSIDIARIES
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UNAUDITED RECONCILIATION OF NON-GAAP MEASURES TO GAAP MEASURES
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(DOLLARS IN MILLIONS)
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The schedules below are presented in order to reconcile adjusted
EBITDA, a non-GAAP measure, to the most directly comparable GAAP
measure in accordance with Section 401(b) of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.
Because the fourth quarter has only recently ended, the information
in the schedules below, is by necessity, preliminary in nature and
based only upon preliminary, unaudited information available to
Charter as of the date of this release. Investors should be aware
that the information in the schedules is subject to change upon the
release of Charter's audited results and therefore should exercise
caution in relying on the information in these schedules and should
not draw any inferences from this information regarding financial or
operating data that is not presented in the schedules. Because of
the potential for further adjustments, investors, in particular,
should not rely on net cash flows from operating activities for the
period ended December 31, 2008.
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Three Months Ended December 31,
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2008
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2007
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Pro Forma (a)
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Pro Forma (a)
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Net cash flows from operating activities
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$
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(12
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$
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(3
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)
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Less: Purchases of property, plant and equipment
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(264
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)
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(354
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)
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Less: Change in accrued expenses related to capital expenditures
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2
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49
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Free cash flow
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(274
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)
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(308
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)
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Interest on cash pay obligations (b)
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470
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457
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Purchases of property, plant and equipment
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264
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354
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Change in accrued expenses related to capital expenditures
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(2
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)
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(49
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)
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Other, net
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17
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7
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Change in operating assets and liabilities
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144
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101
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Adjusted EBITDA
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$
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619
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$
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562
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(a) Pro forma results reflect certain sales and acquisitions of
cable systems in 2007 and 2008 as if they occurred as of January 1,
2007.
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(b) Interest on cash pay obligations excludes accretion of original
issue discounts on certain debt securities and amortization of
deferred financing costs that are reflected as interest expense in
our consolidated statements of operations.
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The above schedules are presented in order to reconcile adjusted
EBITDA and free cash flows, both non-GAAP measures, to the most
directly comparable GAAP measures in accordance with Section 401(b)
of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.
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