Mubasher: Moody's Investors Service assigned Khaleeji Commercial Bank (KHCB) first-time long and short-term local and foreign currency issuer ratings of Ba3, with a negative outlook.
The rating firm also assigned the bank a baseline credit Assessment (BCA) of b1, noting that the rating reflects improving profitability metrics although from a very weak position and resilient deposit-funded profile coupled with healthy liquidity metrics.
“Moody's also incorporates in KHCB's ratings a high likelihood of government support from Bahrain (Ba2 Negative) in case of need, which results in one notch of uplift to the Ba3 long-term issuer rating,” according to the report published on Wednesday.
KHCB’s profits declined 73.77% BHD 359,730 in the third quarter of 2016, compared to BHD 1.37 million in the year-ago period.
