DBRS Morningstar Assigns Provisional Ratings to Cars Alliance Auto Loans Germany V 2021-1

DBRS Ratings GmbH (DBRS Morningstar) assigned provisional ratings to the Class A Notes and Class B Notes (together, the Notes) to be issued by Cars Alliance Auto Loans Germany V 2021-1 (the Issuer) as follows:

-- Class A Notes at AAA (sf)
-- Class B Notes at AA (high) (sf)

DBRS Morningstar did not assign a provisional rating to the Class C Notes expected to be issued in this transaction.

The ratings on the Notes address the timely payment of scheduled interest and ultimate repayment of principal by the legal final maturity date in June 2034, in accordance with the terms of the Notes.

These ratings are provisional and based on the information and data available to this date. These ratings will be finalised upon review of the final version of the transaction documents and of the relevant opinions.

The transaction represents the issuance of Notes backed by a portfolio of auto loan receivables granted by the German branch of RCI Banque S.A. (RCIB or the Seller) to private individuals residing in Germany. The initial portfolio of approximately EUR 973 million will comprise of both balloon and standard amortising loans granted for the purchase of new and used vehicles. The collateral portfolio will also be serviced by RCIB.

DBRS Morningstar based its ratings on a review of the following analytical considerations:
-- The transaction's capital structure, including form and sufficiency of available credit enhancement;
-- Relevant credit enhancement in the form of subordination, reserve funds, and excess spread;
-- Credit enhancement levels are sufficient to support DBRS Morningstar’s projected cumulative net losses under various stressed cash flow assumptions for the Notes;
-- The ability of the transaction to withstand stressed cash flow assumptions and repay investors according to the terms under which they have invested;
--RCIB’s capabilities with regard to origination, underwriting, servicing, and its financial strength;
-- The transaction parties’ financial strength with regard to their respective roles;
-- The credit quality of the collateral and historical and projected performance of the Seller’s portfolio;
-- DBRS Morningstar’s sovereign rating on Germany, currently rated AAA with a Stable trend; and
-- The expected consistency of the transaction’s legal structure with DBRS Morningstar’s “Legal Criteria for European Structured Finance Transactions” methodology and the presence of legal opinions that are expected to address the true sale of the assets to the Issuer.

TRANSACTION STRUCTURE
The transaction includes a 16-month revolving period during which the Issuer shall purchase additional collateral. During this period, the transaction will be subject to receivables eligibility criteria and concentration limits designed to prevent the deterioration of the portfolio quality, which will have to be complied with.

The transaction incorporates a single waterfall that facilitates the distribution of the available distribution amount. The Notes amortise sequentially subject to a note-specific target principal redemption amount.

An amortising general reserve account equal to 0.75% of the outstanding Notes principal balance will be funded by the Seller on the closing date and available to the structure. The general reserve provides liquidity support to the Notes, available to pay senior transaction fees, swap payments, and interest payments on the Notes, while also ultimately providing credit enhancement to the Notes.

All underlying contracts pay fixed rates while floating-rate Class A Notes have been issued, indexed to one-month Euribor. The resulting interest rate risk is mitigated through an interest rate swap agreement and supported by a stand-by swap agreement, expected to be entered into by the Issuer prior to the closing date.

TRANSACTION COUNTERPARTIES
BNP Paribas Securities Services (BNPPSS) has been appointed as the account bank for the transaction. Based on the DBRS Morningstar private rating on BNPPSS, the downgrade provisions outlined in the transaction documents, and other mitigating factors inherent in the transaction structure, DBRS Morningstar considers the risk arising from the exposure to the account bank to be consistent with the ratings assigned to the Notes, as described in DBRS Morningstar's "Legal Criteria for European Structured Finance Transactions" methodology.

RCIB is the swap counterparty for the transaction while Société Générale, S.A. (SocGen) is the stand-by swap counterparty. DBRS Morningstar rates RCIB privately and SocGen publicly with a Long Term Critical Obligations Rating of AA. The downgrade and collateral posting provisions as defined in the draft swap documentation are consistent with the thresholds defined in DBRS Morningstar’s “Derivative Criteria for European Structured Finance Transactions” Methodology.

The transaction structure was analysed in Intex DealMaker.

CORONAVIRUS CONSIDERATIONS
The Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) and the resulting isolation measures have caused an immediate economic contraction, leading in some cases to increases in unemployment rates and income reductions for many borrowers. DBRS Morningstar anticipates that delinquencies may continue to increase in the coming months for many asset-backed securities (ABS) transactions. The ratings are based on additional analysis to expected performance as a result of the global efforts to contain the spread of the coronavirus. For this transaction, DBRS Morningstar applied a moderate haircut to its expected recovery rate and conducted additional sensitivity analysis to determine that the transaction benefits from sufficient liquidity support to withstand high levels of payment holidays in the portfolio.

The DBRS Morningstar Sovereign group releases baseline macroeconomic scenarios for rated sovereigns. These scenarios were last updated on 8 September 2021. DBRS Morningstar analysis considered impacts consistent with the baseline scenario in the below referenced report. For details, see the following commentaries: https://www.dbrsmorningstar.com/research/384150/baseline-macroeconomic-scenarios-for-rated-sovereigns and https://www.dbrsmorningstar.com/research/384482/baseline-macroeconomic-scenarios-application-to-credit-ratings.

On 8 May 2020, DBRS Morningstar published a commentary outlining how the coronavirus crisis is likely to affect DBRS Morningstar-rated ABS transactions in Europe. For more details, please see: https://www.dbrsmorningstar.com/research/360734/european-abs-transactions-risk-exposure-to-coronavirus-covid-19-effect and https://www.dbrsmorningstar.com/research/362712/european-structured-finance-covid-19-credit-risk-exposure-roadmap.

ESG CONSIDERATIONS
A description of how DBRS Morningstar considers ESG factors within the DBRS Morningstar analytical framework can be found in the DBRS Morningstar Criteria: Approach to Environmental, Social, and Governance Risk Factors in Credit Ratings at: https://www.dbrsmorningstar.com/research/373262.

Notes:
All figures are in euros unless otherwise noted.

The principal methodology applicable to the ratings is: Rating European Consumer and Commercial Asset-Backed Securitisations (3 September 2020).

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

DBRS Morningstar has applied the principal methodology consistently and conducted a review of the transaction in accordance with the principal methodology.

An asset and a cash flow analysis were both conducted. Due to the inclusion of a revolving period in the transaction, the analysis considers potential portfolio migration based on replenishment criteria set forth in the transaction legal documents.

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 Morningstar Credit Ratings” of the “Global Methodology for Rating Sovereign Governments” at: https://www.dbrsmorningstar.com/research/381451/global-methodology-for-rating-sovereign-governments.

The DBRS Morningstar Sovereign group releases baseline macroeconomic scenarios for rated sovereigns. DBRS Morningstar analysis considered impacts consistent with the baseline scenarios as set forth in the following report: https://www.dbrsmorningstar.com/research/384482/baseline-macroeconomic-scenarios-application-to-credit-ratings.

The sources of data and information used for these ratings include RCIB, SocGen and BNP Paribas S.A. (as Arrangers).

DBRS Morningstar received the following data and information:
-- Static quarterly cumulative gross loss data from Q1 2010 to Q2 2021 on a total basis and further split into new/used, and amortising/balloon vehicles;
-- Static quarterly cumulative net loss data from Q1 2010 to Q2 2021 on a total basis and further split into new/used, and amortising/balloon vehicles;
-- Dynamic monthly prepayment data from January 2016 to June 2021;
-- Dynamic delinquency data from January 2016 to June 2021;
-- Portfolio stratification tables for the provisional pool as at 30 June 2021; and
-- The portfolio amortisation profile related to the selected pool.

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

DBRS Morningstar was supplied with third-party assessments. However, this did not impact the rating analysis.

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

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

These ratings concern expected-to-be-issued new financial instruments. These are the first DBRS Morningstar ratings on these financial instruments.

Information regarding DBRS Morningstar ratings, including definitions, policies, and methodologies, is available on www.dbrsmorningstar.com.

To assess the impact of changing the transaction parameters on the ratings, DBRS Morningstar considered the following stress scenarios as compared with the parameters used to determine the ratings:

-- Expected default rate: 1.6%
-- Expected recovery rate: 58.0%
-- Loss given default (LGD): 62.3% for the AAA (sf) scenario and 60.9% for the AA (high) (sf) scenario.

Scenario 1: 25% increase in LGD
Scenario 2: 50% increase in LGD
Scenario 3: 25% increase in PD
Scenario 4: 50% increase in PD
Scenario 5: 25% increase in PD and 25% increase in LGD
Scenario 6: 25% increase in PD and 50% increase in LGD
Scenario 7: 50% increase in PD and 25% increase in LGD
Scenario 8: 50% increase in PD and 50% increase in LGD

DBRS Morningstar concludes that the expected ratings under the eight stress scenarios would be, respectively:
-- Class A Notes: AAA (sf), AA (high) (sf), AAA (sf), AA (high) (sf), AA (high) (sf), AA (sf), AA (sf), and AA (low) (sf)
-- Class B Notes: AA (high) (sf), AA (sf), AA (high) (sf), AA (sf), AA (sf), A (high) (sf), AA (low) (sf), and A (sf)

For further information on DBRS Morningstar historical 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. DBRS Morningstar understands further information on DBRS Morningstar historical default rates may be published by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) on its webpage: https://www.fca.org.uk/firms/credit-rating-agencies.

These ratings are endorsed by DBRS Ratings Limited for use in the United Kingdom.

Lead Analyst: Daniel Rakhamimov, Assistant Vice President
Rating Committee Chair: Christian Aufsatz, Managing Director
Initial Rating Date: 30 September 2021

DBRS Ratings GmbH
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Tel. +49 (69) 8088 3500

Geschäftsführer: Detlef Scholz
Amtsgericht Frankfurt am Main, HRB 110259

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

-- Rating European Consumer and Commercial Asset-Backed Securitisations (3 September 2020), https://www.dbrsmorningstar.com/research/366294/rating-european-consumer-and-commercial-asset-backed-securitisations.
-- Rating European Structured Finance Transactions Methodology (30 July 2021), https://www.dbrsmorningstar.com/research/382486/rating-european-structured-finance-transactions-methodology.
-- Legal Criteria for European Structured Finance Transactions (29 July 2021), https://www.dbrsmorningstar.com/research/382171/legal-criteria-for-european-structured-finance-transactions.
-- Derivative Criteria for European Structured Finance Transactions (20 September 2021), https://www.dbrsmorningstar.com/research/384624/derivative-criteria-for-european-structured-finance-transactions.
-- Operational Risk Assessment for European Structured Finance Servicers (16 September 2021), https://www.dbrsmorningstar.com/research/384513/operational-risk-assessment-for-european-structured-finance-servicers.
-- Operational Risk Assessment for European Structured Finance Originators (16 September 2021), https://www.dbrsmorningstar.com/research/384512/operational-risk-assessment-for-european-structured-finance-originators.
-- Interest Rate Stresses for European Structured Finance Transactions (24 September 2021), https://www.dbrsmorningstar.com/research/384920/interest-rate-stresses-for-european-structured-finance-transactions.
-- DBRS Morningstar Criteria: Approach to Environmental, Social, and Governance Risk Factors in Credit Ratings (3 February 2021), https://www.dbrsmorningstar.com/research/373262/dbrs-morningstar-criteria-approach-to-environmental-social-and-governance-risk-factors-in-credit-ratings.

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

For more information on this credit or on this industry, visit www.dbrsmorningstar.com or contact us at [email protected].