WorldCom Revises $1.5 Billion Credit With Its Banks

WorldCom Financial Times

The banks agreed to revise the receivables agreement, replacing a $2 billion agreement with a $1.5 billion credit facility, the story said. The Financial Times also reported that a person close to the carrier's bankers said it seemed likely WorldCom would win support for a new $5 billion facility.

WorldCom's stock was trading at $1.53 in afternoon trading, a rise of 18 cents over a previous close of $1.35.

Fears surrounding WorldCom's financial stability heightened last week when the carrier was cut from the Standard and Poor 500 Index, causing WorldCom's stock to slip by 20 cents to $1.24 on Tuesday.

Following the news, more than 670 million WorldCom shares changed hands on Tuesday, making it the highest traded stock following a previous high of 308.7 million shares of Intel stock traded on Sept. 22, 2000.

Last week Moody's Investor Service cut WorldCom's debt rating to junk status, and Standard and Poor's cut the carrier's bonds to junk status.

Last month WorldCom reported a sharp earnings decline due to customer network downsizing.

For the quarter, WorldCom had income of $184 million, or 6 cents a share, on sales of $5.1 billion, compared with income of $532 million, or 18 cents a share, on sales of $5.2 billion for the year-ago quarter.

First Call estimates were for earnings of 11 cents per share.

Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization were $1.8 billion vs. $1.9 billion for the year-ago period.