BOQ rating under review at Moody's
A second credit rating agency has its view on Bank of Queensland under review. Moody's said yesterday that it may lower the A2 rating on long term debt and the Prime-1 rating on short term debt because of weakening asset quality.Moody's noted that non-performing loans at the end of the financial year (reported by the bank last week) were 2.72 per cent, up from 1.46 per cent at the end of 2010. Moody's also noted increased delinquency rates in the housing and commercial loan books.The funding mix is another issue, with the bank needing wholesale funding for 40 per cent of its book and a third of this being short-term, albeit mostly debt raised from domestic investors.Moody's said in December 2010 that it had a negative outlook on the rating of BOQ.In June, Standard & Poor's lowered its outlook on BOQ's BBB+ long-term rating and A-2 short-term rating to negative from stable.