A Pragmatist’s Guide to Leveraged Finance: Credit Analysis for Bonds and Bank Debt

24. Preparing a Credit Snapshot

What’s in this chapter:

• How to prioritize items when doing an analysis under time pressure

• What items to obtain first and where to obtain them

• Factors in deciding where to go after the basics

In almost any situation where you are asked to do analysis, there is likely to come a time when you will be asked to quickly run a credit summary, effectively a snapshot of the credit. The depth of this analysis will vary by how much time you are given.

First you should try to clearly understand why you are being asked to look at something quickly. Common reasons may be a sudden offering of new debt or breaking news on a company. The priorities of what you will want to look at first will vary. Are you being asked to ...