DBRS Upgrades Ratings of the Notes Issued by 2017 Popolare Bari RMBS S.r.l.

DBRS Ratings Limited (DBRS) upgraded its ratings of the bonds issued by 2017 Popolare Bari RMBS S.r.l. (the Issuer):

-- Class A Notes upgraded to AA (high) (sf) from AA (sf).
-- Class B Notes upgraded to AA (low) (sf) from A (high) (sf).

The rating of the Class A Notes addresses timely payment of interest and ultimate payment of principal on or before the legal final maturity date. The rating of the Class B Notes addresses ultimate payment of interest and principal on or before the legal final maturity date in April 2058.

The upgrades follow an annual review of the transaction and are based on the following analytical considerations:

-- Portfolio performance, in terms of delinquencies, defaults and losses as of the July 2018 payment date.
-- Probability of default (PD), loss given default (LGD) and expected loss assumptions on the remaining receivables.
-- Current available credit enhancement to the rated Notes to cover the expected losses at their respective rating levels.

2017 Popolare Bari RMBS S.r.l. is a securitisation of Italian first-lien residential mortgage loans originated and serviced by Banca Popolare di Bari S.c.p.A. and Cassa di Risparmio di Orvieto S.p.A. The transaction closed in July 2017, when the special-purpose vehicle issued one class of floating-rate senior notes, one class of floating-rate mezzanine notes and two classes of floating-rate and additional return junior notes, namely the Class A Notes, Class B Notes, Class J1 Notes and Class J2 Notes.

PORTFOLIO PERFORMANCE
As of June 2018, two- to three-month arrears represented 0.7% of the outstanding portfolio balance, up from 0.1% in September 2017. The 90+ delinquency ratio was 0.7%, up from 0.2% in September 2017. No mortgage had defaulted in the portfolio.

PORTFOLIO ASSUMPTIONS
DBRS conducted a loan-by-loan analysis of the remaining pool of receivables and maintained its base case PD and LGD assumptions at 9.8% and 8.1%, respectively.

CREDIT ENHANCEMENT
As of the July 2018 payment date, credit enhancement to the Class A Notes was 23.1%, up from 17.9% at the DBRS initial rating. Credit enhancement to the Class B Notes was 13.9%, up from 9.9% at the DBRS initial rating. The credit enhancement to the Class A Notes is provided by the overcollateralisation of the outstanding collateral portfolio. The transaction benefits from a liquidity reserve fund of EUR 17.2 million; the reserve provides liquidity support to the rated Notes and is amortising. It will be replenished up to an amount equal to 3% of the principal amount outstanding of the rated Notes as of the preceding payment date and floored at 1% of the rated Notes initial amount.

BNP Paribas Securities Services SCA/Milan acts as the account bank for the transaction. The DBRS private rating of BNP Paribas Securities Services SCA/Milan complies with the Minimum Institution Rating, given the rating assigned to the rated Notes, as described in DBRS's "Legal Criteria for European Structured Finance Transactions" methodology.

Four swap transactions are in place: two to hedge the basis risk, and two to hedge the fixed-floating interest rate risk. JP Morgan AG acts as swap counterparty. DBRS has given limited credit only to the fixed-floating swap transactions, as the swap documentation is not fully consistent with DBRS’s “Derivate Criteria for European Structured Finance Transactions” methodology.

Notes:
All figures are in euros unless otherwise noted.

The principal methodology applicable to the ratings is the “Master European Structured Finance Surveillance Methodology”. DBRS has applied the principal methodology consistently and conducted a review of the transaction in accordance with the principal methodology.

A review of the transaction legal documents was not conducted as the legal documents have remained unchanged since the most recent rating action.

Other methodologies referenced in this transaction are listed at the end of this press release. These may be found on www.dbrs.com at: http://www.dbrs.com/about/methodologies.

For a more detailed discussion of the sovereign risk impact on Structured Finance ratings, please refer to “Appendix C: The Impact of Sovereign Ratings on Other DBRS Credit Ratings” of the “Rating Sovereign Governments” methodology at: http://dbrs.com/research/319564/rating-sovereign-governments.pdf.

The sources of data and information used for these ratings include investor and payment reports provided by Securitisation Services S.p.A., servicer reports provided by Popolare Bari S.p.A., and loan-level data provided by the European DataWarehouse GmbH.

DBRS did not rely upon third-party due diligence in order to conduct its analysis.

At the time of the initial rating, DBRS was supplied with third-party assessments. However, this did not impact the rating analysis.

DBRS considers the data and information available to it for the purposes of providing these ratings to be of satisfactory quality.

DBRS does not audit or independently verify the data or information it receives in connection with the rating process.

This is the first rating action on this transaction since the initial rating date on 31 July 2017, when DBRS assigned ratings of AA (sf) and A (high) (sf) to the Class A Notes and Class B Notes.

The lead analyst responsibilities for this transaction have been transferred to Ilaria Maschietto.

Information regarding DBRS ratings, including definitions, policies and methodologies is available at www.dbrs.com.

To assess the impact of changing the transaction parameters on the rating, DBRS considered the following stress scenarios as compared with the parameters used to determine the rating (the “Base Case”):

-- DBRS expected a lifetime base case PD and LGD for the pool based on a review of the current assets. Adverse changes to asset performance may cause stresses to base case assumptions and therefore have a negative effect on credit ratings.
-- The base case PD and LGD of the current pool of loans for the Issuer are 9.8% and 8.1%, respectively.
-- The Risk Sensitivity overview below illustrates the ratings expected if the PD and LGD increase by a certain percentage over the base case assumption. For instance, considering the Class A Notes, if the LGD increases by 50%, the rating of the Class A Notes would be expected to remain at AA (high) (sf), assuming no change in the PD. If the PD increases by 50%, the rating of the Class A Notes would be expected to fall to A (high) (sf), assuming no change in the LGD. Furthermore, if both the PD and LGD increase by 50%, the rating of the Class A Notes would be expected to fall to A (sf).

Class A Notes Risk Sensitivity:
-- 25% increase in LGD, expected rating of AA (high) (sf)
-- 50% increase in LGD, expected rating of AA (high) (sf)
-- 25% increase in PD, expected rating of AA (high) (sf)
-- 50% increase in PD, expected rating of A (high) (sf)
-- 25% increase in PD and 25% increase in LGD, expected rating of AA (sf)
-- 25% increase in PD and 50% increase in LGD, expected rating of AA (sf)
-- 50% increase in PD and 25% increase in LGD, expected rating of A (high) (sf)
-- 50% increase in PD and 50% increase in LGD, expected rating of A (sf)

Class B Notes Risk Sensitivity:
-- 25% increase in LGD, expected rating of A (high) (sf)
-- 50% increase in LGD, expected rating of A (high) (sf)
-- 25% increase in PD, expected rating of A (high) (sf)
-- 50% increase in PD, expected rating of BBB (high) (sf)
-- 25% increase in PD and 25% increase in LGD, A (sf)
-- 25% increase in PD and 50% increase in LGD, expected rating of A (low) (sf)
-- 50% increase in PD and 25% increase in LGD, expected rating of BBB (high) (sf)
-- 50% increase in PD and 50% increase in LGD, expected rating of BBB (sf)

For further information on DBRS historic default rates published by the European Securities and Markets Authority (“ESMA”) in a central repository, see:
http://cerep.esma.europa.eu/cerep-web/statistics/defaults.xhtml.

Ratings assigned by DBRS Ratings Limited are subject to EU and US regulations only.

Lead Analyst: Ilaria Maschietto, Senior Financial Analyst
Rating Committee Chair: Christian Aufsatz, Managing Director
Initial Rating Date: 31/07/2017

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The rating methodologies used in the analysis of this transaction can be found at: http://www.dbrs.com/about/methodologies.

-- Legal Criteria for European Structured Finance Transactions
-- Master European Structured Finance Surveillance Methodology
-- Operational Risk Assessment for European Structured Finance Servicers
-- Master European Residential Mortgage-Backed Securities Rating Methodology and Jurisdictional Addenda
-- Interest Rate Stresses for European Structured Finance Transactions
-- Derivative Criteria for European Structured Finance Transactions

A description of how DBRS analyses structured finance transactions and how the methodologies are collectively applied can be found at: http://www.dbrs.com/research/278375.

For more information on this credit or on this industry, visit www.dbrs.com or contact us at info@dbrs.com.