Global company default risk rose in Feb. - index

NEW YORK, Feb 27 (Reuters) - The number of companies at an increased risk of defaulting on their debt globally rose slightly in February, though credit conditions were essentially unchanged from January, Kamakura Corp, a risk management information provider, said on Friday.

Kamakura's index of "troubled" public companies increased 0.1 percentage point in February from January, to 23.2 percent of the global public company universe.

A company is considered "troubled" when its default probability is in excess of 1 percent. The index hit a high of 28 percent in September 2001.

Companies with the largest increase in short-term default risk included Chemtura Corp CEM.N, ArvinMeritor Inc (ARM.N), Belo Corp (BLC.N), Alcatel-Lucent (ALU.N) and Office Depot Inc (ODP.N), Kamakura said.

Companies with a default probability of more than 20 percent fell 0.1 percentage point to 2.7 percent in February, while companies with a 10-to-20 percent default risk dropped 0.2 percentage point to 2.8 percent, the company said.

Companies with a 5-to-10 percent default risk rose 0.1 percentage point to 4.3 percent in the month, and companies with a 1-to-5 percent default probability increased 0.2 percent to 13.3 percent, Kamakura said.

(Reporting by Karen Brettell;)