Mubasher: Moody's Investors Service (Moody's) on Monday announced that it has confirmed the long-term deposit and issuer ratings of ten Qatari banks, in addition to the senior unsecured and subordinated debt ratings of their affiliated entities.
Moreover, the New York-based ratings agency changed the outlook on the ten banks' long-term deposit, issuer and senior unsecured debt ratings to "stable" from "negative".
The ten banks include Qatar National Bank (QNB), Doha Bank, Barwa Bank, Qatar International Islamic Bank (QIIB), Masraf Al Rayan, Qatar Islamic Bank (QIBK) and Commercial Bank of Qatar (CBQ).
Moody's has also affirmed the banks' baseline credit assessments (BCA), adjusted BCAs, Counterparty Risk Assessments (CRAs) and Counterparty Risk Ratings (CRRs), according to the ratings agency's report.
The change in rating is supported by the Qatari banks and the country's operating environment to the ongoing regional dispute with some fellow GCC neighbors and Egypt.
Since 5 June 2017, Qatar has been facing outflows of foreign customers' deposits after four Arab countries led by Saudi Arabia cut their diplomatic and trade ties with the gas-rich state, accusing Qatar of financing terrorism. Doha forcefully denies the charges.
Moody’s noted that reaching a significant settlement regarding the Arab dispute affecting Qatar's credit metrics is a low-probability event in the next 12-18 months.
It is worth noting that Qatari banks were able to maintain strong asset quality and capital buffers and their liquidity buffers remained solid.
Meanwhile, the banking system's reliance on external funding has declined to around 29% of total banking system liabilities from 36% in May 2017.
