S&P Revises Croatia's Zagrebacka Banka Outlook to Negative, Affirms LT Credit Rating at 'BBB'

The outlook was revised in response to Monday’s rating action on Croatia (foreign currency, BBB/Negative/A-3; local currency, BBB+/Negative/A-2), ZABA said in a statement.

The outlook revision reflects risks to Croatia's ability to finance high external imbalances in the present difficult international environment, S&P said earlier this week.

ZABA’s long-term credit rating indicates its dominant market position in terms of clients, good capitalisation, revenue generation and stable sources of financing, the bank added.

ZABA reported a non-consolidated unaudited net profit of over 1.230 billion kuna ($224.1 million/171.6 million euro) for the first nine month of 2008, up 45% on the year.

Its ordinary shares, part of the 28-share benchmark Crobex index of the Zagreb bourse, were traded at 225 kuna by 0916 GMT on Thursday, unchanged from Wednesday’s close.

ZABA (www.zaba.hr) is a unit of Italian banking group Unicredit. There are 33 commercial banks operating in Croatia, a country of 4.4 million people.

(1 euro = 7.1698 Croatian kuna)