Moody's downgrades seven Russian financial institutions; concludes review

Moody's Investors Service has today taken rating actions on the seven Russian financial institutions -- Sberbank, Bank VTB JSC, Gazprombank, Russian Agricultural Bank, Agency for Housing Mortgage Lending OJSC (AHML), Vnesheconombank and Alfa-Bank. These actions follow the weakening of Russia's credit profile, as reflected by Moody's downgrade of Russia's government debt rating to Ba1 from Baa3 on 20th of February, 2015. 

Specifically, Moody's downgraded the supported senior unsecured, subordinated debt and deposit and issuer ratings of the Russian financial institutions. These ratings incorporate uplift based on Moody's assessment of the likelihood of government (systemic) support being made available to each institution, in case of need. The supported ratings of all seven entities have been lowered by one notch. The outlook on the long-term ratings of these institutions is negative, in line with the outlook on the sovereign rating.

In the same rating action the rating agency has also lowered the standalone bank financial strength ratings (BFSR) of Sberbank, Bank VTB, JSC , Gazprombank and Alfa bank. This is due to Moody's expectation that the prolonged recessionary environment in Russia will produce a very challenging operating environment for the country's leading banks and thereby impact their financial fundamentals.

This rating action concludes the review for downgrade placed on these ratings in December 2014.