The ratings on Germany-based Landesbank Hessen-Thueringen Girozentrale (Helaba) are based on Standard&Poor's Ratings Services view of the "S-Finanzgruppe Hessen-Thueringen" (SFHT) as a cohesive, single economic group, and reflect the aggregate financial strength of the SFHT's member banks. Moreover, Standard&Poor's expects that improving cooperation and integration will further enhance the financial strength of SFHT member banks. Helaba and the 50 savings banks in Hesse and Thuringia represent the SFHT's key member institutions. The SFHT benefits from the savings banks' very strong capitalization, strong regional market position, stable retail deposit base, and their good profitability, which is recovering from relatively high loan-loss provisions in previous years. These strengths are partly offset by Helaba's comparatively weaker earnings and business
