Visteon has made a US$16m interest payment on US$453m of bond debt today, a move that some observers said made a speculated imminent filing for bankruptcy less likely.
Analysts had speculated that Visteon would miss the bond payment to conserve cash for a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing.
“We continue to focus on managing through the current challenging operating environment,” spokesman Jim Fisher said.
Ratings agency Fitch said this week that it thought a default by Visteon was imminent or inevitable, saying the supplier had ‘virtually no access’ to outside capital.
With US vehicle producers slashing North American production sharply from the fourth quarter of 2008, the pressure on auto parts suppliers such as Visteon has been increasing in recent weeks.
Lobbying groups for the US auto parts supplier base in February asked the US Treasury for US$18.5bn in emergency funding, citing tight credit conditions and rapid declines in payments from automakers who cut production in recent months.
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