Current Report no. 26 (2011)

Bank Zachodni WBK S.A. rating affected by the rating action taken for Banco Santander

Bank Zachodni WBK S.A. hereby informs on the rating change.

Fitch Ratings-London/Warsaw/Istanbul/Moscow - 22 December 2011: Fitch Ratings has taken various rating actions on certain subsidiaries of large Eurozone banks.

The rating actions reflect the impact on various of the subsidiary banks’ ratings of a potential weakening in the availability of support from parent banks following recent negative rating actions on the parent banks’ Long-term Issuer Default ratings (IDR).

Bank Zachodni WBK S.A. (Poland), whose ultimate parent Banco Santander’s IDR of ‘AA-’ was placed on RWN on 20 December 2011 (see ‘Fitch Places 8 Spanish Banks on RWN Following Sovereign Action’, available at www.fitchratings.com), is one of the banks affected by the rating change.

Current rating of Bank Zachodni WBK S.A.:

Long-term foreign currency IDR: 'A+', placed on RWN
Short-term foreign currency IDR: 'F1', placed on RWN
Viability Rating: 'bbb', Unaffected
Individual Rating: 'C', Unaffected
Support Rating: affirmed at '1'

In taking the above rating actions the application of the relevant criteria was limited only to those parts that relate to support.

Applicable criteria, 'Global Financial Institutions Rating Criteria', dated 16 August 2011, 'National Ratings Criteria' dated 19 January 2011 and 'Rating Financial Institutions Above the Local Currency Sovereign Rating', dated 23 December 2010 are available at www.fitchratings.com.

Legal base:
§ 5 clause 1 point 26 of the Finance Minister’s of 19 February 2009 on current and periodic reports published by the issuers of securities and the rules of equal treatment of the information required by the laws of non-member states.