ON THE SPOT
Why Standard & Poor’s is sticking with Capitec rating
As Treasury comes out to bat for Capitec, asking the Financial Services Board to consider a market abuse probe into the conduct of Viceroy Research, ratings agency Standard & Poor’s (S&P) is sticking by its assessment of Capitec’s credit risk at "BB" – reflecting those of its sovereign (SA) as well as the bank’s "strong capitalisation". Business Day spoke to S&P’s primary credit analyst for banks in SA, Matthew Pirnie. Were you asked to reassess your rating? Ratings agencies can’t really comment until we’ve made [our information] public, so I thought it was best to write something and put it out. If Capitec had asked, we wouldn’t have done it – we don’t do things by request. What is your opinion on Viceroy’s Capitec report? Do you agree with it in full or parts, or do you disagree with its conclusions? I can’t reconcile the numbers they use with the data we have. And therefore, when looking at the financial side, it’s not similar to the data we have. In terms of the legal issues [po...
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