London -- Standard&Poor's CreditWire 11/4/98 -- Standard&Poor's today affirmed its ratings on SEB, SEB Funding Inc. (guaranteed by SEB), SEB (Paris Branch)), and Trygg-Hansa Insurance Co. Ltd. The outlooks on both SEB and Trygg-Hansa are revised to negative from stable. (See list below.) Following SEB's acquisition of Trygg-Hansa in 1997 the ratings of the two companies were equalized. The outlook change reflects the continued deterioration of SEB's emerging markets exposures, for which the bank has raised significant loan loss provisions on its Russian-related exposures. In addition, Standard&Poor's has concerns regarding the impact of a weakening Swedish economy on the bank's earnings. Although the bank benefits from low domestic credit losses and continuing cost savings
