Seventy-six of Australia's top 100 non-financial corporates, by market capitalisation, can expect to see EBITDA growth exceed debt over the projected financial years to 2017, according to a new Fitch Ratings report. These companies were grouped together as "credit-positive".Conversely, there are 24 in the credit-negative zones, where net debt is rising at a faster pace than EBITDA.With more than 75 per cent of Australian corporates in the projected credit-positive zones, the market is clearly expecting the credit profile of most corporates to improve in FY17 compared with FY15, Fitch observed. "We believe this is being driven more by projected lower net debt levels, as opposed to projected higher EBITDA generation."This is "a dramatic shift from the actual historic FY2013-15 case, where there was a more even balance of 53 corporates in the positive-credit zones and 47 in the negative-credit zones," said Fitch in a statement announcing this latest piece of research into corporate credit.Among the major companies surveyed is a group Fitch dubs the "Net Debt Shedders," which includes Fortescue Metals, BHP Billiton, Origin Energy, Rio Tinto, Newcrest Mining, Woodside Petroleum and AGL Energy. Most of these companies are expected to counter the negative impact on their financial profile of lower EBITDA from weak commodity prices with capex curtailments, asset sales, dividend cuts and equity raisings, according to Fitch's analysts.