BOQ Responds to Moody’s Ratings Change
Friday, 20/01/2012
Moody’s has today announced a downgrade of BOQ’s rating from A2 to A3.
Ratings affected by this downgrade are the Bank’s long-term senior unsecured debt rating to A3 from A2, subordinated debt rating to Baa1 from A3, preference stock rating to Ba1(hyb) from Baa3 (hyb), short-term rating to Prime-2 from Prime-1, and Bank Financial Strength Rating to C- from C (its stand-alone rating, which maps to a Baa1 from A3 on the long-term ratings scale).
BOQ Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer Stuart Grimshaw said “While we are obviously disappointed that Moody’s has chosen to downgrade the Bank’s rating, we remain focused on offering our customers a unique and personal banking experience.
“We are confident in terms of our funding requirements for 2012 and, as at 30 August 2011, our reliance on offshore wholesale funding was just 1.5% of the Bank’s total funding.
“Also at 30 August 2011, our Total Capital ratio was 11.4% with Tier 1 Capital of 8.4%.
“We believe BOQ remains a well capitalised Australian Bank with a strong funding and liquidity position; we do not face the same funding pressures as the major banks and believe our wholesale funding task for FY2012 is extremely manageable.”
