London, 11 March 2015 -- Moody's Investors Service has today confirmed at A3 the ratings of the
mortgage covered bonds issued by Raiffeisenbank, a.s.
(not publicly rated).
Today's rating action concludes the review for downgrade that Moody's
initiated on 30 December 2014.
RATINGS RATIONALE
Today's confirmation follows Moody's updated assessment of the issuer's
credit strength and resolves the previous placement of the rating on review
for downgrade. Moody's notes that the confirmation was not caused
by a change in the underlying assets' credit quality.
In particular, the remaining legal uncertainty regarding whether
over-collateralisation (OC) will remain in the cover pool and available
for the benefit of covered bond holders after an insolvency of the issuer
limits the rating uplift available by OC and therefore creates a strong
link between the issuer rating and the covered bonds ratings.
Moody's reference point for determining the probability that Raiffeisenbank
a.s will cease making payments under the covered bond programme,
the covered bond (CB) anchor, is senior unsecured rating +1
notches, given that Raiffeisenbank a.s 's debt ratio is between
5% and 10%.
Moody's timely payment indicator (TPI) remains "Very Improbable" for these
covered bonds.
KEY RATING ASSUMPTIONS/FACTORS
Moody's determines covered bond ratings using a two-step process;
an expected loss analysis and a TPI framework analysis.
EXPECTED LOSS: Moody's uses its Covered Bond Model (COBOL) to determine
a rating based on the expected loss on the bond. COBOL determines
expected loss as (1) a function of the probability that the issuer will
cease making payments under the covered bonds (a CB anchor event);
and (2) the stressed losses on the cover pool assets following issuer
default.
The cover pool losses for this programme is an estimate of the losses
Moody's currently models if a CB anchor event occurs. Moody's splits
cover pool losses between market and collateral risks. Market risks
measure losses stemming from refinancing risks and risks related to interest
rate and currency mismatches. These losses may also include certain
legal risks. Collateral risks measure losses resulting directly
from the cover pool assets' credit quality. Moody's derives the
collateral risk from the collateral score.
The cover pool losses for this programme are 48.7%,
with market risk of 41.2% and collateral risk of 7.5%.
The programme's collateral score is 11.3%.
The nominal OC in this cover pool is 44.0%, of which
0% is the statutory minimum. The minimum OC level that is
consistent with the A3 rating is 17.5% in nominal value
terms, of which the issuer should provide 0% in a committed
form. These numbers show that Moody's is relying on uncommitted
OC in its expected loss analysis.
All numbers in this section derive from Moody's most recent modelling,
based on data as per 30 September 2014 for the cover pool assets and per
31 December 2014 for the covered bonds. For further details on
cover pool losses, collateral risk, market risk, collateral
score and TPI Leeway across all covered bond programmes rated by Moody's
please refer to "Moody's EMEA Covered Bonds Monitoring Overview,"
published quarterly.
TPI FRAMEWORK: Moody's assigns a TPI, which indicates the
likelihood that the issuer will make timely payments to covered bondholders
in the event of an issuer default. The TPI framework limits the
covered bond rating to a certain number of notches above the CB anchor.
FACTORS THAT WOULD LEAD TO AN UPGRADE OR DOWNGRADE OF THE RATING:
The CB anchor is the main determinant of a covered bond programme's rating
robustness. The TPI Leeway measures the number of notches by which
Moody's might lower the CB anchor before the rating agency downgrades
the covered bonds because of TPI framework constraints. The TPI
Leeway for this programme is not public.
A multiple notch downgrade of the covered bonds might occur in certain
limited circumstances, such as (1) a sovereign downgrade negatively
affecting both the CB anchor and the TPI; (2) a multiple-notch
lowering of the CB anchor; or (3) a material reduction of the value
of the cover pool.
RATING METHODOLOGY
The principal methodology used in this rating was "Moody's Approach to
Rating Covered Bonds," published on 12 March 2014. Please
see the Credit Policy page on www.moodys.com for a copy
of this methodology.
We published a Request for Comment (RFC) on 8 January 2015. In
the RFC, we propose an adjustment to the anchor point we use in
our covered bond analysis. The proposed changes in this RFC apply
to all new and existing ratings for covered bonds. If we adopt
the proposed changes, we expect more covered bond ratings to be
positively affected than negatively affected. However, in
light of the banking RFC (see RFC published on 9 September 2014 by our
Banking group) and the CR rating RFC , measure (see RFC published
on 8 January 2015 by our Banking group) we are not in a position to fully
assess and disclose the exact impact of the proposed changes to our covered
bond methodology https://www.moodys.com/researchdocumentcontentpage.aspx?docid=PBS_SF390257.
REGULATORY DISCLOSURES
For further specification of Moody's key rating assumptions and sensitivity
analysis, see the sections Methodology Assumptions and Sensitivity
to Assumptions of the disclosure form.
Moody's did not use any stress scenario simulations in its analysis.
For ratings issued on a program, series or category/class of debt,
this announcement provides certain regulatory disclosures in relation
to each rating of a subsequently issued bond or note of the same series
or category/class of debt or pursuant to a program for which the ratings
are derived exclusively from existing ratings in accordance with Moody's
rating practices. For ratings issued on a support provider,
this announcement provides certain regulatory disclosures in relation
to the rating action on the support provider and in relation to each particular
rating action for securities that derive their credit ratings from the
support provider's credit rating. For provisional ratings,
this announcement provides certain regulatory disclosures in relation
to the provisional rating assigned, and in relation to a definitive
rating that may be assigned subsequent to the final issuance of the debt,
in each case where the transaction structure and terms have not changed
prior to the assignment of the definitive rating in a manner that would
have affected the rating. For further information please see the
ratings tab on the issuer/entity page for the respective issuer on www.moodys.com.
For any affected securities or rated entities receiving direct credit
support from the primary entity(ies) of this rating action, and
whose ratings may change as a result of this rating action, the
associated regulatory disclosures will be those of the guarantor entity.
Exceptions to this approach exist for the following disclosures,
if applicable to jurisdiction: Ancillary Services, Disclosure
to rated entity, Disclosure from rated entity.
Regulatory disclosures contained in this press release apply to the credit
rating and, if applicable, the related rating outlook or rating
review.
Please see www.moodys.com for any updates on changes to
the lead rating analyst and to the Moody's legal entity that has issued
the rating.
Please see the ratings tab on the issuer/entity page on www.moodys.com
for additional regulatory disclosures for each credit rating.
Hadrien Rogier
Asst Vice President - Analyst
Structured Finance Group
Moody's Investors Service Ltd.
One Canada Square
Canary Wharf
London E14 5FA
United Kingdom
JOURNALISTS: 44 20 7772 5456
SUBSCRIBERS: 44 20 7772 5454
Juan Pablo Soriano
MD - Structured Finance
Structured Finance Group
JOURNALISTS: 44 20 7772 5456
SUBSCRIBERS: 44 20 7772 5454
Releasing Office:
Moody's Investors Service Ltd.
One Canada Square
Canary Wharf
London E14 5FA
United Kingdom
JOURNALISTS: 44 20 7772 5456
SUBSCRIBERS: 44 20 7772 5454
Moody's confirms Raiffeisenbank a.s.'s A3 covered bonds ratings