Fitch upgrades rating outlook on four Romanian banks

February 4, 2010

Bucharest, Feb 4 /Agerpres/ - Just two days after upgrading Romania's outlook from negative to stable, Fitch Ratings, the credit rating agency, on Thursday, also upgraded from negative to stable the outlook on four important banks operating in Romania, the agency reports in a press release.

Fitch mentions that the Foreign-Currency Long-Term Issuer Default Rating and the support rating of the four Romanian banks (Banca Comerciala Romana, BRD-Group Societe Generale, UniCredit Tiriac Bank and Banca Romaneasca) depend upon the institutional support they receive from their foreign parent companies and are constrained by Romania's default rating (BBB).

For BCR, Fitch confirmed both Foreign-Currency Long-Term Issuer Default Rating and Local-Currency Long-Term Issuer Default Rating at 'BBB', upgrading the outlook from negative to stable.

For BRD- Group Societe Generale, Fitch confirmed Foreign-Currency Long-Term Issuer Default Rating at 'BBB', upgrading the outlook from negative to stable.

Fitch also affirmed UniCredit Tiriac Bank's Foreign-Currency Long-Term Issuer Default Rating at 'BBB' and upgraded the outlook from negative to stable.

As for Banca Romaneasca, Fitch affirmed Foreign-Currency Long-Term Issuer Default Rating at 'BBB', and upgraded the outlook from negative to stable.

At present, Moody's Investors Service is the only important rating agency that continues to assign Romania an investment-grade rating and the current grade is Baa3.

Standard & Poor's have assigned Romania a 'BB-plus' investment grade, the highest grade within the junk category, negative outlook.

The rating assigned to Romania by Fitch Ratings falls under the same junk category. AGERPRES

[www.romaniapress.com]

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