The Pakistan Credit Rating Agency Limited
Press Release
a

Rating Action
Lahore: (16-June-2005)
    PACRA Maintains Entity Ratings of KASB Bank Limited
 

 
Analyst
Shahzad Saleem
(+92-42-586 9504)
shahzad@pacra.com

 

 

 











 

 

Disclaimer
This press release is transmitted to you for this sole purpose of dissemination through your newspaper/magazine/agency. The press release may be used by you in full or in part without changing the meaning or context thereof but with due credit to PACRA. However, PACRA has the sole right of distribution of its press releases for consideration or otherwise through any media.

  

The Pakistan Credit Rating Agency (PACRA) has maintained the long-term and short-term entity ratings of KASB Bank Limited at "BBB+" (Triple B plus) and "A2" (A two), respectively. These ratings, applicable to senior unsecured creditors (depositors) of the bank, denote a low expectation of credit risk emanating from an adequate capacity for timely payment of financial commitments.

The ratings reflect the bank's limited outreach and franchise value that place it at a disadvantage in competing against the better known and larger sized local banks. The management, being cognizant of these impediments, is strengthening human and infrastructure resources alongwith developing a range of products to achieve business growth. The ratings also take into account the bank's subdued profitability, which though improving is unlikely to add substantially towards the bank's risk absorption capacity. Meanwhile, the regulator's pronounced inclination for larger equity-based banks would continue exerting pressure on the bank.

About the bank: KASB Bank Limited, formerly Platinum Commercial Bank Limited, was incorporated in October 1994 and is listed on all three stock exchanges of the country. KASB group and an Omani group have acquired the majority stake in the bank in October 2002. The bank's eight member Board of Directors comprises experienced professionals and is fully involved in the development of the bank's strategy and actively monitors its execution. A team of professionals backs the President and CEO, a business graduate with working experience in various international banks in Pakistan and Middle East in senior management positions.

 
 
The primary function of PACRA is to evaluate the capacity and willingness of an entity to honor its obligations. Our ratings reflect an independent, professional and impartial assessment of the risks associated with a particular instrument or an entity.

PACRA's comprehensive offerings include instrument and entity credit ratings, insurer financial strength ratings, fund ratings, asset manager ratings and real estate gradings.

PACRA's opinion is not a recommendation to purchase, sell or hold a security, in as much as it does not comment on the security's market price or suitability for a particular investor.