Teenagers who are focused on appearancecan choose options that enhance rather than detract from their appearance.Adults also have many more options than in the past, including customized gearfor activities such as fishing and hunting. Providing support to FITB’s ratings, the company has taken several steps toaugment its capital base, including the aforementioned capital raise. Within thepast year, FITB has also cut its quarterly common dividend from $0.44 per shareto $0.01 per share, conserving approximately $1 billion in capital per year.More recently, the company announced the sale of a majority stake of itspayments processing business to private-equity firm Advent International. Bank liquidity is also considered solid given a significant amount ofborrowing capacity, and a good core deposit base. In addition, FITB’sability to access the capital markets helped moderate a more severe ratingaction. FITB was found to need an additional $1.1 billion in common equity under the’more adverse’ scenario of the Supervisory Capital Assessment Program (SCAP).FITB has since issued $1 billion in common stock, and has exchangedapproximately $700 million of its preferred stock for common stock; therebyallowing FITB to raise an amount in excess of the SCAP capital requirement.These issuances have strengthened the balance sheet, and have helped fortify thealready good liquidity position of the holding company.
Bank RatingsReview’, dated May 7, 2009, an analysis of the notching between IDRs and hybridequity instruments has been underway, and Fitch has taken similar action onother issuers. As discussed in Fitch’spress release, ‘Expectations for Higher Loan Losses Driving U.S. Despite FITB’s efforts to deal with its high level of problemassets, Fitch expects FITB to report continued deterioration in asset qualitywhich will make it difficult for the company to return to profitability in 2009.Fitch has also widened the notching on FITB’s outstanding hybrid equity, whichincludes $3.4 billion of preferred stock issued under the Capital PurchaseProgram and $2.5 billion in trust preferred securities. FITB has taken positive steps to addressits credit challenges, such as exiting problematic lending sectors, tighteningunderwriting criteria, and selling/transferring to sale approximately $1.6billion in loans. FITB’s problem loan portfolios include thehomebuilder, brokered home equity, and Florida residential mortgage books, whichrepresent approximately 9% of loans. FITB has been battling significant ongoing asset quality issues since late 2007due to extremely challenging residential housing markets in its footprint, mostnotably in Florida and Michigan.
FITB’s ratings had been placed on RatingWatch Negative on May 15, 2009 as part of Fitch’s U.S bank review, which wasannounced on May 7, 2009 Fitch has since completed its review of FITB. AlthoughFitch views FITB’s capital raise favorably, Fitch anticipates that FITB willface elevated levels of credit costs over the next several quarters andpressured levels of core profitability. Fitch downgraded FITB’s ratings given current and expected asset qualitydeterioration, resulting earnings pressure, as well as continued economic stressand uncertainty in FITB’s markets. CHICAGO–(Business Wire)–(This is an amended version of a press release issued earlier today containingrevised information on the preferred stock ratings for Fifth Third Bancorp andFifth Third Capital Trust IV-VII.) Fitch Ratings has downgraded the long-term Issuer Default Rating (IDR) of FifthThird Bancorp (FITB) and its subsidiary (see complete list below) to ‘A-’ from’A', and removed them from Rating Watch Negative The Rating Outlook isNegative. and Canadianorganizations committed to reducing boating accidents and enhancing theboating experience.
Visit for campaign materialsand additional safe boating resources.SOURCEThe National Safe Boating CouncilDace de la Foret, , or Brent Wilder,, +1-614-224-8114, both for National Safe BoatingCouncil; Technical Contact: Rachel Burkholder, +1-703-361-4294,. The campaign is producedunder a grant from the Sports Fish Restoration and Boating Trust Fund,administered by the U.S Coast Guard. Partners hold local events, teachclasses, distribute educational materials and perform free Vessel SafetyChecks, among other activities.About the National Safe Boating CouncilThe National Safe Boating Council represents over 330 U.S. The North American Safe Boating Campaign unites the efforts of a wide varietyof boating safety advocates, including the National Association of StateBoating Law Administrators (NASBLA), the Canadian Safe Boating Council and themany members of the National Safe Boating Council.
By setting an example this summer, parents can instill alifetime of life jacket wear for their children. Life jacket wear by every boater is the leading goal of the North AmericanSafe Boating Campaign, which kicked off officially with National Safe BoatingWeek, May 16 – 22. And, life jackets are available ina range of prices providing a reasonably priced investment in family safety. Citizens Against Government Wasteis a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to eliminating waste, fraud,abuse, and mismanagement in government CAGWLeslie K Paige202-467-5334 Copyright Business Wire 2009.
