The Czech Republic-based bank Ceska sporitelna, a.s. (Ceska) sustainably improved its additional loss-absorbing capacity (ALAC) buffers thanks to eligible bail-inable bonds. We think that the bank will issue more ALAC-eligible instruments in the next few years to meet its minimum requirement for own funds and eligible liabilities (MREL), which will provide protection to senior creditors in a resolution scenario. We therefore upgraded the long-term issuer credit ratings on Ceska to 'A+' from 'A' and the resolution counterparty ratings to 'AA-/A-1+' from 'A+/A-1'. The stable outlook reflects our expectation that Ceska will maintain sufficiently high ALAC buffers in the next 12-24 months, particularly through planned issuances of senior nonpreferred and tier 2 bonds. On Oct. 29, 2024, S&P Global Ratings upgraded
