Greece

Standard & Poor’s affirmed Alpha Covered Bond programme at A-, on negative outlook, on Wednesday, and removed it from CreditWatch negative.

Moody’s downgraded from A1 to A3 mortgage-backed covered bonds issued by Greece’s Marfin Egnatia Bank last Friday because of a cut in the senior unsecured rating of its parent, Cyprus’s Marfin Popular Bank.

Moody’s has downgraded Marfin Egnatia Bank from Baa2 to Baa3 because of a weakened ability of its parent to provide support if required. However, the ratings are on positive outlook.

National Bank of Greece has set up a second covered bond programme “as part of its strategic planning for optimal use of its balance sheet and development of contingent liquidity”, it said yesterday (Thursday).

Moody’s yesterday (Tuesday) cut covered bonds issued by Alpha Bank, EFG Eurobank Ergasias and National Bank of Greece because it downgraded the Greek sovereign by four notches the day before.

Greece’s Alpha Bank has set up a new covered bond programme that allows for direct issuance.

Fitch downgraded three Greek mortgage covered bond programmes yesterday (Thursday), and left them on rating watch negative, due to severely impaired market funding sources for Greek assets.

Moody’s cut the ratings of the covered bond programmes of Alpha Bank and EFG Eurobank Ergasias on Friday after downgrading the issuers and seven other Greek banks because of their weakening stand-alone financial strength and worries about the country’s challenged economic prospects.

Moody’s cut the ratings of mortgage covered bonds of four Greek issuers yesterday (Thursday), and left them on review for further downgrade, after increasing the refinancing margins it uses in its analysis of Greek covered bonds.

Standard & Poor’s cut the rating of Alpha Bank’s covered bonds from AA- to A- yesterday (Wednesday) after the Greek issuer’s rating was cut from BBB to BB on Tuesday.

Standard & Poor’s yesterday (Tuesday) cut the ratings of four Greek banks after downgrading their sovereign by three notches.

Fears of losses resulting from any Greek government debt restructuring panicked markets yesterday (Tuesday) after Standard & Poor’s downgraded Greece from BBB+ to BB+, on negative outlook, making it the first member of the euro-zone to have its debt cut to junk status.