overview of investor conference call today , enron hosted a conference call to give investors a current overview of the company . here ' s an update of what we discussed during the call .
we told investors that we ' re doing everything we can to protect their interests and to regain their confidence . our focus remains on our credit quality , balance sheet and liquidity , which are essential for our continued success and expansion of our wholesale businesses .
it took more than a few weeks to get where we are today . here ' s a snapshot of significant events that led to our current situation :
- - in hindsight , we definitely made some very bad investments in our non - core businesses over the past several years . those include investments in azurix , india and brazil . they have performed far worse that we could have ever imagined when we made these investments ;
- - because of these bad investments , we ' ve become over - leveraged as a company . the negative impact of those investments was exacerbated through the extensive use of debt capital both on and off our balance sheet ;
- - we also entered into related party transactions that led to a loss of investor confidence , which has been very damaging ;
- - we ' ve been criticized for our lack of transparency and our hard - to - understand financial and operating disclosures ; and
- - on top of it all , we discovered errors in our financial statements , as discussed in our 8 - k filing last week , that required a restatement of previously reported earnings .
we ' ve taken a new look at our businesses and have separated them into three areas : core businesses , non - core businesses , and businesses under review .
core businesses
our core businesses remain strong and consistent sources of significant earnings and cash flows for the company . they ' re our competitive advantage . these include :
- - natural gas pipeline businesses ;
- - gas and power businesses in north america and europe ;
- - retail businesses in north america and europe ; and
- - coal businesses in north america and europe .
the events of the past few weeks have had a temporary negative impact on our projected fourth quarter profitability . it ' s too early to tell at this time what impact this might have on our operating results . we are considering these actions now so that we can quickly return to normal business in 2002 .
i also remain optimistic that the actions we ' ve taken over the past couple of weeks have addressed our customer and counterparty credit and liquidity concerns . according to our business unit leaders , we have definitely seen improvement in our counterparty relationships .
non - core businesses
our non - core businesses include our global assets group and our broadband division . we have invested more than $ 8 billion in these businesses , and the return from them has been dismal .
we have an aggressive program in place to exit these businesses and expect that the sale of these businesses will generate billions of dollars in cash that we can use to repay debt and reinvest in our core businesses . we already have more than $ 800 million in assets contracted for sale this year . they include ceg rio , a gas ldc in brazil ; ecoelectrica , a power plant and lng receiving terminal in puerto rico ; and asset sales of offshore oil and gas properties in india . the approximately $ 2 . 9 billion portland general sale is also on target to close in late 2002 pending regulatory approvals .
businesses under review
these businesses are comprised of those operations outside our power and gas wholesale businesses and include global and industrial markets . while several of these businesses have very strong future prospects , we need to determine if their capital requirements and near - term growth prospects are sufficient enough in terms of earnings and cash generation .
reviewing our businesses this way will help determine where we need to make reductions to our work force . more information will follow as soon as it becomes available .
credit rating / 10 - q filing
we continue to meet regularly with credit rating agencies and believe that our liquidity enhancements and scheduled asset sales will strengthen our balance sheet and maintain our investment grade credit rating . our current credit ratings by the three major rating agencies are as follows :
- - moody ' s at baa 3 " under review for further downgrade "
- - fitch at bbb - " evolving status "
- - s or investor relations , enron corp . , enron building , 1400 smith street , houston , tx 77002 , phone : ( 713 ) 853 - 3956 , fax : ( 713 ) 646 - 3302 .
in addition , the identity of the persons who , under sec rules , may be considered " participants in the solicitation " of dynegy and enron shareholders in connection with the proposed transactions , and any description of their direct or indirect interests , by security holdings or otherwise , are available in an sec filing under schedule 14 a made by each of dynegy and enron .