OREANDA-NEWS. April 19, 2010. The international rating agency Fitch Ratings affirmed the Long-term Issuer Default Rating of AB Bank SNORAS at “B+” with a Stable Outlook. The same rating, i.e. “B+”, was granted for the bank’s Eurobonds issued in May 2007, reported the press-centre of Bank SNORAS.

The reading of the international rating agency Fitch Ratings committee meeting positively assessed Bank SNORAS actions while consolidating the capital base; besides, in Lithuania Bank SNORAS occupies 14.6 per cent of the retail deposit market, 7.5 per cent of the banking assets market and is also an important participant in the retail banking of the Lithuanian market.

“I think that the improvement of the rating outlook was also influenced by the last year’s results of the bank’s activity as well as by the carried out actions while consolidating the capital base and optimizing the activity expenditures. The following goals have been achieved: in August last year we distributed the first in Lithuania emission of the termless debt securities included in the capital. In December, myself and Mr. Vladimir Antonov, as the main shareholders of the bank, provided subordinated loans to the bank,” says Raimondas Baranauskas, the President of AB Bank SNORAS.

During 2009, the Bank SNORAS deposit portfolio increased almost by LTL 1 billion (28 per cent), the activity income grew by LTL 29.5 million and the bank’s assets increased by LTL 650 million, whereas the total value of the assets owned by the banks in the market decreased by LTL 5.2 billion. The value of the bank’s share market within the last year increased by 2.6 times and surpassed other listed Lithuanian banks by several times, while the bank’s capitalization at the end of the year exceeded LTL 400 million.

According to R. Baranauskas, the actions performed last year allowed to considerably (by LTL 146 million) increase the bank’s capital base and to raise the capital adequacy indicator almost by 11 per cent. In the mean time, rearrangement of the owned assets permitted almost to double the bank’s liquidity indicator which presently reaches 55.16 per cent. It is likely that the decisions of the rating agency were positively influenced also by the fact that even during the economic recession last year Bank SNORAS earned a really tangible net profit of LTL 8.7 million.

The current ratings provided to AB Bank SNORAS by Fitch Ratings are as follows:

Long-term Issuer Default Rating: “B+”

Issued Eurobonds rating: “B+”

Rating Outlook: Stable.