Standard & Poor's placed BBB long-term contractor credit ratings of OAO Bank VTB and its daughter enterprise OAO VTB-Leasing on its CreditWatch list, with Negative outlook. At the same time, the two companies’ ruAAA national scale ratings were placed on CreditWatch (with Negative rating outlook) as well.

‘Placing the ratings on CreditWatch reflects the possibility of a strong negative impact that the recent acquisition of Bank of Moscow (no S&P rating) can make on them: the money spent can affect VTB’s capital performance, all risks considered, and the quality of the newly bought bank’s assets is also still unclear. There are also some other risks related to the M & A,’ says Standard & Poor's credit analyst Ekaterina Trofimova.

‘Buying Bank of Moscow alongside with the acquisition of a smaller asset, TransCreditBank (BB/Stable/B; ruAA) (the purchase of the controlling shareholding will be finally through this March) might weaken Bank VTB’s capitalization figures,’ the agency reports.

‘Besides, VTB is now only working on checking Bank of Moscow’s assets’ quality. It could actually turn out worse than what the officially available data state,’ the agency adds.