Monday, December 1 2014 18:59
Moody's assigns (P)Ba2 rating to senior unsecured notes of Armenia's Ardshinbank CJSC; outlook stable
ArmInfo. Moody's Investors Service has today assigned a provisional (P)Ba2 long-term global foreign-currency debt rating to the senior unsecured notes of Ardshinbank CJSC. The rating carries a stable outlook.
The (P)Ba2 foreign-currency debt rating was assigned to the following debt instruments to be issued by Ardshinbank:
- Three-year $75 million senior unsecured notes due 2017
The (P)Ba2 rating is based on Ardshinbank's local-currency deposit rating of Ba2. The debt rating is underpinned by the bank's adequate capitalisation, good profitability, acceptable asset quality, and one of the largest branch networks in Armenia, which supports the bank's franchise. However, the rating also takes into account the bank's exposure to Armenia's undiversified economy.
The rating assigned to Ardshinbank's senior unsecured notes is provisional. Moody's issues provisional ratings in advance of the final sale of securities and the above-mentioned rating reflects Moody's preliminary credit opinions regarding the transaction only. Upon a conclusive review of the final documentation and the final note structure, Moody's will endeavour to assign a definitive rating to the aforementioned notes. A definitive rating may differ from a provisional rating.
According to Ardshinbank, as of Oct 1 2014 the bank's assets totaled $670mln, capital $116mln, net profit $9.9mln (3rd rank). The bank has 55 branches (13 in Yerevan, 6 in Nagorno-Karabakh, 36 all over Armenia).
On Nov 13 2014 Ardshininvestbank was renamed back to Ardshinbank. Ardshininvestbank was established in 2002. The majority shareholder of the bank is the Center for Business Investments (97.23%). Ardshinbank is one of the leaders of Armenia's banking system. It is in top 3 in capital, assets, loans and obligations. Almost 20% of its loans are given to SMEs.