Morningstar DBRS Finalizes Provisional Credit Ratings on Navient Refinance Loan Trust 2025-A

DBRS, Inc. (Morningstar DBRS) finalized its provisional credit ratings on the following classes of notes issued by Navient Refinance Loan Trust 2025-A (Navient 2025-A):

-- $503,000,000 Class A Notes rated AAA (sf)
-- $22,000,000 Class B Notes rated AA (sf)
-- $25,000,000 Class C Notes rated A (sf)

CREDIT RATING RATIONALE
The credit ratings are based on Morningstar DBRS' review of the following considerations:
(1) The transaction's form and sufficiency of available credit enhancement.
-- Overcollateralization, subordination of the Class B and Class C Notes to the Class A Notes, and Class C Notes to the Class B Notes, cash on deposit in the reserve accounts, and excess spread create credit enhancement levels that are commensurate with the credit ratings.
-- Transaction cash flows are sufficient to repay investors under all AAA (sf), AA (sf) and A (sf) stress scenarios in accordance with the terms of the Navient 2025-A transaction documents.

(2) The sequential-pay structure.

(3) Structural features of the transaction that require the most senior outstanding class of Notes to enter into full turbo principal amortization under certain circumstances.

(4) The quality and credit characteristics of the student loans and underlying borrowers.

(5) The ability of the servicer and subservicer to perform collections on the collateral pool and other required activities.

(6) The transaction assumptions consider Morningstar DBRS' baseline macroeconomic scenarios for rated sovereign economies, available in its commentary Baseline Macroeconomic Scenarios for Rated Sovereigns March 2025 Update, published on March 26, 2025. These baseline macroeconomic scenarios replace Morningstar DBRS' moderate and adverse COVID-19 pandemic scenarios, which were first published in April 2020.

(7) The legal structure and legal opinions that address the true sale of the student loans, the nonconsolidation of the trust, that the trust has a valid first-priority security interest in the assets, and the consistency with Morningstar DBRS' Legal Criteria for U.S. Structured Finance.

Morningstar DBRS' credit ratings on the securities referenced herein address the credit risk associated with the identified financial obligations in accordance with the relevant transaction documents. The associated financial obligations for each of the rated notes are the related Noteholders' Interest Distribution Amount, including unpaid interest from the preceding distribution date, and the related Principal Amount.

Morningstar DBRS' credit ratings do not address non-payment risk associated with contractual payment obligations contemplated in the applicable transaction documents that are not financial obligations. The associated contractual payment obligation that is not a financial obligation for each of the rated notes is the interest on any unpaid interest from the preceding distribution date.

Morningstar DBRS' long-term credit ratings provide opinions on risk of default. Morningstar DBRS considers risk of default to be the risk that an issuer will fail to satisfy the financial obligations in accordance with the terms under which a long-term obligation has been issued. The Morningstar DBRS short-term debt rating scale provides an opinion on the risk that an issuer will not meet its short-term financial obligations in a timely manner.

ENVIRONMENTAL, SOCIAL, AND GOVERNANCE CONSIDERATIONS   
There were no Environmental/Social/Governance factor(s) that had a significant or relevant effect on the credit analysis.

A description of how Morningstar DBRS considers ESG factors within the Morningstar DBRS analytical framework can be found in the Morningstar DBRS Criteria: Approach to Environmental, Social, and Governance Factors in Credit Ratings (August 13, 2024) https://dbrs.morningstar.com/research/437781.

Notes:
All figures are in US dollars unless otherwise noted.

The principal methodology applicable to the credit ratings is Rating U.S. Private Student Loan Securitizations (November 11, 2024) https://dbrs.morningstar.com/research/442835.

Other methodologies referenced in this transaction are listed at the end of this press release.

The credit rating was initiated at the request of the rated entity.

The rated entity or its related entities did participate in the credit rating process for this credit rating action.

Morningstar DBRS had access to the accounts, management and other relevant internal documents of the rated entity or its related entities in connection with this credit rating action.

This is a solicited credit rating.

Please see the related appendix for additional information regarding the sensitivity of assumptions used in the credit rating process.

DBRS, Inc.
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New York, NY 10005 USA
Tel. +1 212 806-3277

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

Rating U.S. Structured Finance Transactions (March 10, 2025)
https://dbrs.morningstar.com/research/449616

Operational Risk Assessment for U.S. ABS Originators and Servicers (December 05, 2024)
https://dbrs.morningstar.com/research/444162

Legal Criteria for U.S. Structured Finance (December 03, 2024)
https://dbrs.morningstar.com/research/444064

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