OT (Obtuse Topic) Credit Rating Cut Raises New Worries About Uranium Plants

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Credit Rating Cut Raises New Worries About Uranium Plants By Katherine Rizzo Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) - The company that owns both the nation's uranium enrichment operations had its credit rating cut Friday, increasing the possibility that a plant might be closed. The move by Standard & Poor's Corp. sent U.S. Enrichment Corp. stock tumbling 23 percent on the New York Stock Exchange. At 5:15 p.m. EST, it was down $1.37 1/2 at $4.50.

Congress approved a plan in 1998 that changed USEC from a government agency into a private, investor-owned company. The deal included a promise by USEC officials to keep open the Portsmouth plant and the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Kentucky until Jan. 1, 2005.

Closing one of the plants is possible only under certain conditions. One of those conditions, a decline in the corporate credit rating to below investment grade - junk bond status - was met Friday when Standard & Poor's dropped USEC's rating from BBB to BB+.

USEC spokeswoman Elizabeth Stuckle said the company has made no decision about its next move.

"We're analyzing the Standard & Poor's downgrade as we speak," she said.

USEC cut 250 jobs last year and announced plans Thursday to trim 850 more people from its work force of 3,800 at the two plants.

USEC has been hurt by falling prices for enriched uranium, used to fuel nuclear power plants. The company also is losing money on a deal to buy Russia's uranium stockpile and sell it to utility companies worldwide. The deal was set up by the U.S. government to keep Soviet-era warhead uranium away from terrorists and from radical nations trying to develop nuclear weapons.

Criticism of USEC is intensifying on Capitol Hill.

The Clinton administration should have been keeping a close eye on USEC all along, said House Commerce Committee Chairman Tom Bliley, R-Va., but "it seems the administration only responds after a crisis occurs."

"I am especially concerned that the Clinton administration's continuing failure to predict or plan for USEC's problems may have compromised our ability to protect our country's national security."

AP-ES-02-04-00 1936EST ) Copyright 2000 Associated Press. -------------------

-- Dee (T1colt556@aol.com), February 04, 2000

Answers

1. Investment grade junk bonds? Lower than that? Sounds like something that my ex-brother-in-law would have tried to get me to buy...

2. National defense is important...just not to the current administration, judging from its actions...

-- Mad Monk (madmonk@hawaiian.net), February 04, 2000.


PRIVATISE....Your Shirt is gone...Your Pants will be next..

NO NUKES IS GOOD NUKES!

-- Misanthrope (HBOMBS@onwho.next), February 05, 2000.


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