...The Long-Term Issuer Default Ratings (IDRs) of Standard Bank Group Limited (SBG) and its main operating subsidiary, The Standard Bank of South Africa Limited (SBSA), are driven by their standalone creditworthiness, as expressed by their `bb-' Viability Ratings (VRs), which are one notch below the implied VRs of `bb' due to operating environment and sovereign rating constraints. This underlines the concentration of activities in South Africa and high sovereign- related exposure relative to capital (232% of SBSA's equity at end-2M25). The VRs reflect SBG's leading domestic and regional franchise, strong profitability and comfortable capital buffers and liquidity. The National Ratings reflect the entities' creditworthiness in local currency relative to that of other South African issuers. VRs Equalised with Group: The VR of SBG, a non-operating bank holding company (BHC), is equalised with the group VR due to the absence of double leverage (end-2024: 98%), and high fungibility of capital and...
