Fitch Rates AMT's Senior Unsecured Notes 'BB+'

CHICAGO--(Business Wire)--
Fitch Ratings has assigned a 'BB+' rating to American Tower Corporation's (AMT)
proposed ten-year $300 million senior unsecured notes. Proceeds from the notes
offering will be used to reduce existing indebtedness and for general corporate
purposes. The Rating Outlook is Stable. Fitch rates AMT's long-term Issuer
Default Rating (IDR) at 'BB+'.

AMT's ratings are underpinned by the company's high margin, which was 68% for
the last twelve months (LTM) ending March 31, 2009 and reflective of the
significant operational scale provided by its large tower portfolio. These
factors, combined with favorable demand characteristics for wireless voice and
data services, translate into sustainable strong operating performance and free
cash flow growth. AMT operates with some of the highest profitability measures
among corporate issuers and its predictable and growing cash flow stream,
generated primarily from long-term lease contracts with investment-grade
national wireless operators, leads to a low business risk profile. AMT, as well
as other companies in the tower industry, are expected to benefit from wireless
carriers expanding their networks following the Advanced Wireless Services
spectrum auction and 700-MHz spectrum auction, which were completed in 2006 and
2008, respectively. Fitch expects this growth to more than offset modest effects
of wireless operator consolidation on AMT's results.

Concerns are relatively modest and consist of uncertainty regarding the timing
of payments to the company by certain international customers operations
suffering from the lack of credit availability. International expansion,
including the pending acquisition of XCEL Telecom in India, slightly increases
the company's risk profile, but operations outside of the domestic market are
expected to remain modest. Fitch also notes that the company has scaled back its
share repurchase activity, with less than $2 million of common stock repurchased
in the first quarter of 2009, in order to retain substantial financial
flexibility.

As a result of the limited share repurchases, AMT's gross leverage metric is
strong for the rating category at 4.0 times (x) for the LTM ending March 31,
2009. Should substantial share repurchases or a material strategic transaction
take place that raises leverage above the 4.5x level, Fitch would consider
revising its Rating Outlook to Negative.

Fitch views AMT's liquidity position as strong due to the meaningful free cash
flow generation, its balance sheet cash and favorable maturity schedule relative
to available liquidity. Debt maturities over the remainder of 2009 through 2011
are only $60 million, substantially exceeded by free cash flow (FCF), which for
the LTM was approximately $548 million. Cash, including restricted cash, was
$365 million as of March 31, 2009, and Fitch expects FCF levels in 2009 growing
over the $530 million achieved in 2008. Fitch notes that nearly $2 billion of
debt, including the revolver, is due in 2012.

Liquidity is also provided by a $1.25 billion revolving credit facility (matures
June 8, 2012) and at March 31, 2009, the company had drawn $750 million on the
facility and had approximately $5 million in undrawn letters of credit
outstanding, leaving approximately $495 million available.

AMT subsidiaries are not guarantors of the notes, and the notes would be
structurally subordinated to all existing and future indebtedness of its
subsidiaries. Fitch expects any new long-term debt will be issued by AMT.
Financial covenants for the new unsecured notes are the same as the October 2007
$250 million unsecured notes offering and include limitation on subsidiary
indebtedness, limitation on liens and consolidation and sale of assets.

Fitch's rating definitions and the terms of use of such ratings are available on
the agency's public site, www.fitchratings.com. Published ratings, criteria and
methodologies are available from this site, at all times. Fitch's code of
conduct, confidentiality, conflicts of interest, affiliate firewall, compliance
and other relevant policies and procedures are also available from the 'Code of
Conduct' section of this site.

Fitch Ratings
John Culver, CFA, +1-312-368-3216
Bill Densmore, +1-312-368-3125 (Chicago)
Media Relations:
Cindy Stoller, +1-212-908-0526 (New York)
cindy.stoller@fitchratings.com

Copyright Business Wire 2009