Moody's downgrades three Bahraini banks' ratings to Baa3/Prime-3, negative outlook

Moody's Investors Service has today downgraded to Baa3/Prime-3 from Baa2/Prime-2 the deposit, issuer and senior unsecured debt ratings of three Bahraini Banks: BBK B.S.C., National Bank of Bahrain BSC, and Bahrain Development Bank B.S.C. Concurrently, Moody's downgraded the baseline credit assessments (BCAs) of BBK and National Bank of Bahrain to ba1 from baa3. These actions follow Moody's downgrade of Bahrain's government bond ratings to Baa3 from Baa2 on 16 April 2015 and reflect (1) the government's reduced capacity of support, and (2) the challenges in view of weaker economic growth. The negative outlooks assigned to the Baa3 long-term ratings of the three banks are aligned with the negative outlook on the government's Baa3 bond rating.