Bulletin: CaixaBank Ratings Unaffected By Announced Divestment Of Two Large Financial Institutions' Holdings

MADRID (Standard&Poor's) Dec. 4, 2015--Standard&Poor's Ratings Services said today that its ratings and outlook on Spanish CaixaBank S.A. (BBB/Stable/A-2) are unaffected by the divestment of its interest in two financial groups--The Bank of East Asia, Limited and Grupo Financiero Inbursa, SAB de CV--to its parent holding company, Criteria CaixaHolding S.A.U., valued at €2.6 billion. In exchange, CaixaBank will receive a cash payment of €642 million and shares amounting to 9.9% of its share capital, which it plans to amortize. Once the transaction completes, subject to regulatory approvals, likely in the first quarter of 2016, we acknowledge that CaixaBank will achieve one of its targets in its 2015-2018 strategic plan--to reduce the capital allocated by the operating

...MADRID (Standard & Poor's) Dec. 4, 2015--Standard & Poor's Ratings Services said today that its ratings and outlook on Spanish CaixaBank S.A. (###/Stable/A-2) are unaffected by the divestment of its interest in two financial groups--The Bank of East Asia, Limited and Grupo Financiero Inbursa, SAB de CV--to its parent holding company, Criteria CaixaHolding S.A.U., valued at 2.6 billion. In exchange, CaixaBank will receive a cash payment of 642 million and shares amounting to 9.9% of its share capital, which it plans to amortize. Once the transaction completes, subject to regulatory approvals, likely in the first quarter of 2016, we acknowledge that CaixaBank will achieve one of its targets in its 2015-2018 strategic plan--to reduce the capital allocated by the operating entity to equity investments. The transaction will also help the group's holding company, Criteria, to gain some diversification on its investments. However, in our view, the transaction has no implications for the group's...

Bulletin