Avis Budget Car Rental LLC sold $450 million of senior notes in the 144a private placement market on March 5, said IFR, a Thomson Reuters service.

The size of the deal was increased from an originally planned $400 million.

Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Barclays Capital, Citigroup, Deutsche Bank, JP Morgan and Wells Fargo were the joint bookrunning managers for the sale.

Avis said it intends to use the net proceeds of the offering for general corporate purposes and to help repay debt on its floating rate term loan, which has an effective interest rate of approximately 9.2 percent.

As a result of the sale, Moody’s Investors Service raised the car rental company’s ratings. Moody’s said the changes related to its expectation that the company would close its offering of senior unsecured notes on the same day it announced the sale.

Moody's raised Avis's senior secured credit facility rating to "Ba2" from "Ba3" and its senior unsecured debt rating to "B3" from "Caa1."

The ratings service reiterated its "B2" corporate family and probability of default ratings, and set a "B3" rating for Avis' issuance of $400 million in senior unsecured notes.

Moody's said its ratings outlook for Avis is still "Positive."