Global Arab Network | Moody's assigns Aa3 senior ratings to .0 billion programme (EMTN) of Banque Saudi Fransi

Translate this article to your language:

GANPublications

e-Publications

Add Site to Favorites

Add Page to Favorites

Make Homepage

Share This Page

RSS Feed

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| |

Moody's assigns Aa3 senior ratings to $2.0 billion programme (EMTN) of Banque Saudi Fransi

Global Arab Network - - Rabih Serrai

Monday, 29 March 2010 17:22

Moody's Investors Service has today assigned ratings to the US$2.0 billion euro medium-term note programme (EMTN) of Banque Saudi Fransi (BSF). Senior unsecured and subordinated notes issued under this programme would be rated at Aa3 and A1, respectively. Moody's also expects to assign a Aa3 rating to the bank's first US$650 million senior unsecured drawdown under the programme. The definitive rating will be assigned upon receipt of all duly executed and final documentation. All ratings carry a stable outlook.

The rating for senior unsecured notes is set at the same level as the local currency deposit rating for the bank. Moody's adds that BSF's Aa3 long-term local currency deposit rating is based on (i) the bank's A2 Baseline Credit Assessment (a measure of stand-alone financial strength, which maps directly from BSF's C+ bank financial strength rating) and (ii) two notches of uplift, reflecting the rating agency's assessment of a very high probability of systemic support for the bank in the event of need.

Moody's notes that the ratings on BSF's EMTN programme do not immediately apply to any individual notes issued under the programme. Ratings on individual notes issued under the programme are subject to Moody's satisfactory review of the terms and conditions set forth in the final prospectuses, supplements, or offering memorandums of the notes to be issued.

Furthermore, Moody's does not intend to assign the programme rating to individual notes issued under the programme with features linked to the performance of another obligor (credit-linked notes); moreover, Moody's does not intend to assign the programme rating to notes for which payment of principal and/or interest is variable and contractually dependent on either the occurrence of a non-credit-linked event or the performance of an index (non-credit-linked notes), except for notes whose principal and coupon payments are affected by standard sources of variation (see Moody's Special Comment, "Moody's Update on Rating Debt Obligations with Variable Promises," June 2009).

Moody's previous rating action on BSF was on 15 February 2010 when it upgraded the bank's long-term global foreign currency deposit ratings to Aa3 from A1.

The principal methodologies used in rating BSF were Moody's "Bank Financial Strength Ratings: Global Methodology" (February 2007), "Incorporation of Joint-Default Analysis into Moody's Bank Ratings: A Refined Methodology" (March 2007) and "Moody's Guidelines for Rating Bank Hybrid Securities and Subordinated Debt" (November 2009), and available on www.moodys.com in the Rating Methodologies sub-directory under the Research & Ratings tab. Other methodologies and factors that may have been considered in the process of rating this issuer can also be found in the Rating Methodologies sub-directory on Moody's website.

Headquartered in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, BSF reported total assets of US$32.2 billion as at end-December 2009.

Global Arab Network

Add comment

The opinions of the authors in articles published are theirs alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of Global Arab Network
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Published comments are the opinions of private individuals and do not reflect the views of Global Arab Network