Fitch Clarifies Ratings Published by Sanlam Alternative Income Fund
Fitch Ratings-London-09 December 2009: Fitch Ratings is clarifying certain National ratings published by Sanlam Alternative Income Fund (SAIF) in its fund fact sheets. The agency notes that some of these ratings had not been published by Fitch and that these publications by SAIF contained discrepancies.
SAIF invests in redeemable cumulative preference shares and requires that these shares, and certain preference share issuers, obtain a rating from Fitch, either in the form of a public, private or shadow rating. Fitch therefore today clarifies National ratings assigned to certain South African issuers. In most instances the redeemable cumulative preference shares are not direct obligations of the below issuers, but are issued by subsidiaries of these issuers and benefit from credit enhancement or other support provided by the one of the parties listed below.
For the sake of clarity, the entities below currently have the following National Long-term ratings. Each of these ratings, together with the related research, has been, and continues to be available on www.fitchratings.com:
ABSA Bank Limited: 'AAA(zaf)'/Outlook Stable
FirstRand Bank Limited: 'AA(zaf)'/Outlook Negative
FirstRand Bank Holding Limited: 'AA-(zaf)'/Outlook Negative
FirstRand Limited: Not rated
Investec Bank Limited: 'AA-(zaf)'/Outlook Negative
Investec Limited: Not rated on the South African national scale
Nedbank Limited: 'AA-(zaf)'/Outlook Stable
Nedbank Group Limited: 'AA-(zaf)'/Outlook Stable
Sanlam Capital Markets Limited: 'A+(zaf)'/Outlook Negative
Sanlam Limited: 'AA-(zaf)'/Outlook Negative
The Standard Bank of South Africa Limited: 'AA(zaf)'/Outlook Stable
Fitch monitors all the above ratings.
A Shadow rating on FirstRand Limited was also made public by SAIF. Shadow ratings, suffixed with an asterisk (e.g. 'XX+*'), are not intended for publication and may be based on a lower level of information, or may represent an otherwise full analysis that excludes one or more (disclosed) analytical elements, precluding shadow rating opinions from representing full rating opinions. In each case, the shadow rating is not fully comparable in all regards with published ratings at that level. See www.fitchratings.com for a full explanation.
Contacts: Mark Young, +44 (0)20 7417 4268, Philip Walsh, +44(0)20 7417 3556, Anthony Walker, Alfons Ideler, Tertius Smith +27 (0)11 380 0900.
Media Relations: Hannah Warrington, London, Tel: +44 (0) 207 417 6298, Email: hannah.warrington@fitchratings.com.
Additional information is available on www.fitchratings.com.
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