New York, September 13, 2019 -- Moody's Investors Service ("Moody's") upgraded Advanced Micro Devices,
Inc.'s ("AMD") corporate family rating to Ba2 from Ba3 and senior
unsecured rating to Ba3 from B1. The speculative grade liquidity
rating of SGL-1 remains unchanged. The outlook is positive.
RATINGS RATIONALE
The upgrade of the corporate family rating to Ba2 reflects AMD's improved
performance outlook, driven by continued design wins, market
share gains, and an expanded set of product offerings and customers.
Moody's expects significant revenue growth in the second half of 2019
and continued growth in 2020 driven by new desktop, mobile,
server, and graphics chips, partially offset by lower than
expected semi-custom revenue related to game consoles that are
expected to transition to a new generation in 2020. Additionally,
Moody's projects leverage will continue to decline while the company's
liquidity profile remains robust.
Over the last three years, AMD's product roadmap execution
has improved considerably with the company successfully launching multiple
generations of commercial and consumer desktop processors, mobile
processors, a new graphics lineup, and two generations of
EPYC server processors. A decision last year by one of AMD's foundry
partner (GlobalFoundries Inc.) to not pursue 7 nanometer technology
means AMD has and will continue to increase its reliance on its other
foundry partner, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd (TSMC)
for leading edge chip making. GlobalFoundries Inc. had historically
manufactured most AMD's CPUs. Moody's believes the increased use
of TSMC for leading edge microprocessor production provides additional
manufacturing roadmap certainty for AMD and its customers, which
is a credit positive. AMD is currently shipping server, desktop,
and graphics chips on the 7 nanometer process node, while Intel's
challenges at 10 nanometers that are expected to last into 2020.
Moody's expects AMD's product and manufacturing positioning
to leave it well placed to increase market share broadly over the next
year. Despite AMD's good operating prospects, Moody's
expects the company will continue to face stiff competition from strong
and higher rated companies such as Intel as well as NIVIDIA Corporation
("Nvidia").
Driven by an improved product positioning throughout its portfolio,
Moody's projects profitable growth in the second half of 2019 and through
2020. With recent new product launches, revenue is likely
to grow 25% year-over-year in the second half of
2019 with at least high-single digit revenue growth in 2020.
And with higher average selling prices and compelling chip performance,
gross margins should expand to the 42% to 43% range,
while EBITDA margins improve to the 13% to 15% range,
up from 10% to 11% over the last year. Staging working
capital related to this strong growth, however, remains a
temporary constraint to cash flow generation, resulting in negative
$303 million cash flow after capital expenditures over the last
two quarters. Moody's expects positive free cash flow in
the second half of 2019 as customer PC and server launches using AMD's
new chips support working capital conversion.
AMD's SGL-1 rating reflects the company's very good liquidity profile
that allows the company to internally fund this investment. AMD
reported $1.1 billion of cash and cash equivalents as of
June 2019 (buttressed by $449 million warrant exercise by a subsidiary
of Mubadala Development Company PJSC ("Mubadala") earlier this year.
Mubadala has been a decade long investor and owns less than 5%
of AMD. AMD also maintains access to an unused $500 million
secured revolving credit facility. With cash balances, access
to the credit facility, Moody's projection of positive free
cash flow and no debt maturities until $312 million is due in August
2022, AMD has very good liquidity.
AMD's strong performance and periodic early repayment of various
debt instruments have contributed to a notable improvement in financial
leverage, with adjusted gross debt to EBITDA of 2.6x at June
2019, down from 5.9x at December 2017. With potential
further debt reduction and strong projected earnings growth, Moody's
anticipates adjusted gross debt to EBITDA will decline to below 2.0x
by December 2019 with further improvement in 2020.
Upgrades:
..Issuer: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
.... Corporate Family Rating, Upgraded
to Ba2 from Ba3
.... Probability of Default Rating,
Upgraded to Ba2-PD from Ba3-PD
....$312 million (outstanding) Senior
Unsecured Notes due 2022 , Upgraded to Ba3 (LGD4) from B1 (LGD4)
....$176 million (outstanding) Senior
Unsecured Notes due 2024, Upgraded to Ba3 (LGD4) from B1 (LGD4)
Unchanged:
..Issuer: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
.... Speculative Grade Liquidity Rating,
SGL-1
Outlook Actions:
..Issuer: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
....Outlook, Changed To Positive From
Stable
The positive outlook reflects AMD's much improved balance sheet and broadened
product positioning and prospects for improved operating performance and
cash generation over the next year. The ability to consistently
execute product and technology transitions, as well as competition
from strong competitors such as Intel and Nvidia remain key challenges.
The rating could be upgraded if AMD is able to sustain solid business
execution, grow revenue and improve operating profitability and
sustain positive free cash flow. Additionally, continued
conservative financial practices, including maintaining cash and
liquid investments of approximately $1 billion or more, could
support a higher rating.
The rating could be downgraded if AMD's revenue growth reverses due to
uncompetitive products, or if 1) EBITDA margins decline below 8%;
2) free cash flow turns negative, or 3) cash and liquid investments
drop below $600 million (without raising additional debt).
The principal methodology used in these ratings was Semiconductor Industry
published in July 2018. Please see the Rating Methodologies page
on www.moodys.com for a copy of this methodology.
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (AMD) is a fabless semiconductor
company that specializes in microprocessors, graphics processing
units and semi-custom and embedded processors. AMD reported
revenue of $5.9 billion for the twelve months ended June
2019.
REGULATORY DISCLOSURES
For ratings issued on a program, series, category/class of
debt or security this announcement provides certain regulatory disclosures
in relation to each rating of a subsequently issued bond or note of the
same series, category/class of debt, security or pursuant
to a program for which the ratings are derived exclusively from existing
ratings in accordance with Moody's rating practices. For ratings
issued on a support provider, this announcement provides certain
regulatory disclosures in relation to the credit rating action on the
support provider and in relation to each particular credit rating action
for securities that derive their credit ratings from the support provider's
credit rating. For provisional ratings, this announcement
provides certain regulatory disclosures in relation to the provisional
rating assigned, and in relation to a definitive rating that may
be assigned subsequent to the final issuance of the debt, in each
case where the transaction structure and terms have not changed prior
to the assignment of the definitive rating in a manner that would have
affected the rating. For further information please see the ratings
tab on the issuer/entity page for the respective issuer on www.moodys.com.
For any affected securities or rated entities receiving direct credit
support from the primary entity(ies) of this credit rating action,
and whose ratings may change as a result of this credit rating action,
the associated regulatory disclosures will be those of the guarantor entity.
Exceptions to this approach exist for the following disclosures,
if applicable to jurisdiction: Ancillary Services, Disclosure
to rated entity, Disclosure from rated entity.
Regulatory disclosures contained in this press release apply to the credit
rating and, if applicable, the related rating outlook or rating
review.
Please see www.moodys.com for any updates on changes to
the lead rating analyst and to the Moody's legal entity that has issued
the rating.
Please see the ratings tab on the issuer/entity page on www.moodys.com
for additional regulatory disclosures for each credit rating.
Richard J. Lane
Senior Vice President
Corporate Finance Group
Moody's Investors Service, Inc.
250 Greenwich Street
New York, NY 10007
U.S.A.
JOURNALISTS: 1 212 553 0376
Client Service: 1 212 553 1653
Lenny J. Ajzenman
Associate Managing Director
Corporate Finance Group
JOURNALISTS: 1 212 553 0376
Client Service: 1 212 553 1653
Releasing Office:
Moody's Investors Service, Inc.
250 Greenwich Street
New York, NY 10007
U.S.A.
JOURNALISTS: 1 212 553 0376
Client Service: 1 212 553 1653