Moody's Investors Service assigned its "Baa1" rating to Louisville-based Baptist Healthcare System's proposed $130 million series 2018A revenue refunding bonds. At the same time, Moody's upgraded the health system's parity debt to "Baa1" from "Baa2," affecting $442 million of debt.
The upgrade and assignment are a result of the health system's significant financial turnaround, streamlined governance, large service area, healthy liquidity and adequate debt service coverage.
The outlook was revised to stable from negative, reflecting Moody's expectation that the health system will continue to see financial improvement in the near term.