OREANDA-NEWS. Fitch Ratings has affirmed the ratings of the class II A-1 senior notes at 'Asf' and the class II B subordinate notes at 'BBsf' for the floating rate student loan asset-backed notes issued by Access Group Inc., Series 2001 Indenture of Trust (Group II). The Rating Outlook is revised to Stable from Negative for both classes.

KEY RATING DRIVERS

Collateral Quality: The trust is collateralized by approximately $63 million of private student loans as of May 2016. The loans were originated under Access Group's Private Student Loan Program. The projected remaining defaults are expected to range between 4%-7% of the current pool balance. A recovery rate of 25% was applied, which was based on data provided by the issuer.

Credit Enhancement (CE): CE is provided by overcollateralization, excess spread, and for the senior notes, subordination provided by the class B notes. As of the May 2016 distribution, the senior and total parity ratios have increased to 115.17% and 105.41% from 113.14% and 103.55% a year ago, respectively. Any excess cash in the trust is applied as additional principal payment for the mandatory redemption of the outstanding notes.

Adequate Liquidity Support: Liquidity support is provided by a $300,000 capitalized interest account.

Servicing Capabilities: Day-to day servicing is provided by Xerox Education Services. Fitch believes their servicing operations are acceptable servicer of private student loans at this time.

"Under the Counterparty Criteria for Structured Finance and Covered Bonds", dated July 18, 2016, Fitch looks to its own ratings in analyzing counterparty risk and assessing a counterparty's creditworthiness. The definition of permitted investments for this deal allows possibility of using investments not rated by Fitch, which represents a criteria variation. Since the only available funds to invest in are those held in the Collection Account, and the funds can only be invested for a short duration of three months given the payment frequency of the notes, Fitch doesn't believe such variation has a measurable impact upon the ratings assigned.

RATING SENSITIVITIES

As Fitch's base case default proxy is derived primarily from historical collateral performance, actual performance may differ from the expected performance, resulting in higher loss levels than the base case. This will result in a decline in CE and remaining loss coverage levels available to the bonds and may make certain bond ratings susceptible to potential negative rating actions, depending on the extent of the decline in coverage. Fitch will continue to monitor the performance of the trust.

DUE DILIGENCE USAGE

No third party due diligence was provided or reviewed in relation to this rating action.

Fitch has affirmed the following ratings:

Access Group, Inc. 2001 Indenture of Trust:

--Class II A-1 at 'Asf'; Outlook revised to Stable from Negative;

--Class B at 'BBsf'; Outlook revised to Stable from Negative.