On Sept. 29, 2008, Standard&Poor's Ratings Services lowered to 'A' from 'A+' its long-term counterparty credit ratings on the core operational entities and a number of subsidiaries of Belgian-Dutch banking and insurance group Fortis (see Ratings List below). We also affirmed the 'A-1' short-term ratings on these entities. In addition, we lowered to 'A-/A-2' from 'A/A-1' the long- and short-term counterparty credit ratings on Fortis SA/NV and Fortis N.V., the group's two holding companies. The outlooks on all the abovementioned ratings are developing. At the same time, we lowered the ratings on the group's hybrid capital instruments and junior subordinated debt by two notches (see list). The rating actions reflect Standard&Poor's opinion that Fortis group's leading
