HONG KONG (Standard&Poor's) April 11, 2014--Standard&Poor's Ratings Services today assigned its 'A-' long-term and 'A-2' short-term program rating to a proposed US$1 billion medium-term notes (MTN) program by Azure Orbit II International Finance Ltd., a special purpose company wholly owned by Bank of Communications Co. Ltd. (BOCOM: A-/Stable/A-2; cnAA/cnA-1). We also assigned our 'cnAA' long-term and 'cnA-1' short-term Greater China regional scale ratings to the program. BOCOM's Macau branch unconditionally and irrevocably guarantees the program. The guarantee constitutes direct, unconditional, and unsubordinated and unsecured obligations of the branch. These obligations rank equally with all other unsecured obligations of the branch, other than subordinated obligations, if any, except for certain obligations required to be preferred by law.
