“Standard&Poor's” (S&P) beynəlxalq reytinq agentliyi “PAŞA Bank”ın uzunmüddətli və qısamüddətli kredit reytinqlərini “BB-/B” səviyyəsində təsdiq edib. Reytinq üzrə proqnoz “mənfi”dir.

Məlumatda, Bankın 2018-ci il ərzində Azərbaycan, Türkiyə və Gürcüstanda bazar payı və biznes həcmini artırmaq məqsədilə yüksək kreditləşmə templərini saxladığı bildirilir.

Agentlik hesab edir ki, Azərbaycanda bazar mövqeyinin möhkəmlənməsi, digər maliyyə təşkilatlarına nisbətən coğrafi diversifikasiyanın daha yüksək göstəriciləri, həmçinin səhmdarların banka dəstək verməyə hazır olmaları “PAŞA  Bank”ın biznesinin stabilliyinə təsir edir, həmçinin kapitallaşma göstəricilərinə olan təzyiqi neytrallaşdırır.

"S&P" yaxın 12-18 ay ərzində bankın biznesinin yüksək artım templərinin və hələ də Türkiyədə fəaliyyət göstərmənin yüksək iqtisadi risklərinin bankın biznesinin stabillik göstəricilərinə və aktivlərin keyfiyyətinə göstərə biləcəyi mənfi təsirləri nəzərə alaraq reytinq proqnozunu “neqativ” saxladığını qeyd edir.

Azerbaijan-Based PASHA Bank Affirmed At 'BB-/B'; Outlook Negative

-PASHA Bank sought high lending growth throughout 2018, aiming to expand its business volumes and market share in Azerbaijan, Turkey, and Georgia.

-We think that the bank's strengthening market position in Azerbaijan, better-than-peers' geographical diversity, and supportive shareholder underpin its business stability and funding profile, and offset sustained pressure on capitalization.

-We are therefore affirming our long- and short-term ratings on PASHA Bank at 'BB-/B'.

-The negative outlook continues to reflect our view that, in the next 12-18 months, the bank's high business growth alongside still-high economic risks in Turkey may put pressure on its business sustainability and asset quality.

its 'BB-' long-term and 'B' short-term issuer credit ratings on Azerbaijan-based PASHA Bank. The outlook remains negative.

The affirmation reflects our view that the bank's creditworthiness continues to benefit from its solid market position in Azerbaijan's corporate lending  sector, better-than-peers' geographical business diversification, and ongoing capital and funding support from its shareholder, PASHA Holding. We believe these benefits largely offset sustained pressure on the bank's capital or potential risks associated with high lending growth.

PASHA Bank continued its strategy of high business growth in Azerbaijan, Turkey and Georgia throughout 2018. We estimate that the bank's loan portfolio increased by about 25% last year, with growth in Azerbaijan of close to 32%. The bank's share in the system-wide corporate lending reached around 17% as of Sept. 30, 2018 (9% at end-2016), which is significant given the highly concentrated Azerbaijani banking sector. We expect PASHA Bank will continue above-average business growth in Azerbaijan to increase further its market share and business volumes in corporate banking. We view the bank's ample reported liquidity, lack of material legacy problems, strong brand, and significant investments in digital capabilities as its competitive advantages, which would likely enable the bank to fortify its business position in the country and improve its client diversity. We also note that overseas business in Turkey and Georgia, which now represent about 25% of the bank's loan portfolio, increases the geographical diversity of the bank's business model and supports its business stability. As such, we think that the competitive trends are favorable for PASHA Bank's business position and could facilitate improvements in the bank's creditworthiness in the coming 12-18 months.

At the same time, we no longer consider the bank's capital position to be a rating strength, but rather a neutral factor. This is because we expect that the bank's capitalization reflected in our risk-adjusted capital (RAC) ratio will likely deteriorate to below 7% over the next 12 months due to high actual and expected lending growth, substantial foreign currency translation losses, increased economic risks in Turkey, and relatively aggressive dividend policy employed by PASHA Holding, among other factors. We expect that the bank's growth will continue to outpace its internal capital generation and weigh on its capital adequacy. Nevertheless, we note that regulatory capital ratios remain at comfortable levels for all of the bank's operating entities.

We think that PASHA Holding remains committed to providing capital support to the bank if needed. In 2018, PASHA Holding directly injected Turkish lira (TRY) 253 million (about $46 million) into PASHA Yatirim Bankasi, PASHA Bank's Turkish subsidiary. The shareholder also provided $11 million of subordinated debt to the bank, with a five-year maturity. This year, PASHA Holding may inject up to Azerbaijani manat (AZN) 27 million (approximately $16 million) of subordinated debt with high loss-absorption capacity features, which we would likely include in calculation of our RAC ratio. However, the shareholder will continue distributing 60% of the consolidated net income over the next two years.

We think that the bank's funding profile remains concentrated with top-20 depositors representing 67% of total customer deposits as of mid-year 2018 (versus 71% at end-2017). Nevertheless, we believe that a number of strengths in the bank's funding profile offset risks stemming from the excessive concentrations. We note that over the past four years, customer deposits have been relatively stable and the bank maintains a substantial liquidity buffer, which covered around 77% of all customer deposits as of June 30, 2018 Almost all the bank's funding and liquidity metrics look superior compared with peers, with stable funding ratio of close to 214% (versus about 120% average for peers) and loan-to-deposit ratio of below 50% over the past three years. Finally, we incorporate in our funding assessment the ongoing support from the shareholder in the form of stable related parties' accounts, which further contributes to the stability of the bank's customer deposits. We note that the volumes of these accounts have been sustainably growing over the past three years, while the portion in corporate liabilities declined to 55% from 36%, reflecting growth in customer franchise. We therefore assess the bank's funding profile as a neutral rating factor.

The bank's asset quality remains solid compared with local peers: Over the first half of 2018, the bank's nonperforming assets declined by AZN19.0 million to AZN89.3 million, representing 5.7% of the loan portfolio versus 7.7% at year-end 2017. In comparison, we estimate that problem assets represent close to 20%-23% in the system-wide loans in Azerbaijan. The bank also reduced the single-name concentration in its portfolio to 40% from 45% at year-end 2017, which is now of Independent States. We do not expect material impairments of the bank's portfolio in Turkey because of its short-term and secured nature, consisting mainly of factoring and trade finance loans. However, considering our expectation of elevated lending growth in the highly risky economic environment of Azerbaijan and Turkey, we can't exclude the increase of nonperforming loans and credit losses in 2019-2020.

The negative outlook on PASHA Bank reflects our view that the bank's concentrated business model, high lending growth, and high risks in Turkey and Azerbaijan may upset the sustainability of its business or asset quality.

We could lower the ratings in the next 12 months if saw that the bank's expanding market reach does not improve its client diversity. Greater volatility of revenues or earnings due to deteriorating economic conditions in Turkey may also prompt us to take a negative rating action. Finally, we would consider a downgrade if the bank's asset quality substantially deteriorates, for example, driven by higher problem assets and credit losses than we currently anticipate.

We could revise the outlook to stable if we saw that PASHA Bank's increasing market share in Azerbaijan improves its customer diversity and further strengthens its pricing power and business stability.

PULSUZ SEMİNARA QATIL, QAZANMAĞI ÖYRƏN!

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