SINGAPORE (Standard&Poor's) March 8, 2007--Standard&Poor's Ratings Services believes that the three Singapore-headquartered banks could tolerate some easing in their capital ratios without diminishing their credit profile to an extent that their credit ratings would be lowered. This is assuming present conditions prevail. The banks are DBS Bank Ltd. (AA-/Stable/A-1+), Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp. Ltd. (A+/Stable/A-1), and United Overseas Bank Ltd. (A+/Stable/A-1). Standard&Poor's also feels that the extent of any reduction is likely to be lower than the potential capital cushion (over the minimum regulatory capital) that could be derived using the Basel-II Internal Ratings-Based (IRB) methodology. "By both the new and the previous Tier 1 regulatory capital hurdles, all three major Singapore banks are comfortably
