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Non-Tech : Providian Financial Corporation (NYSE: PVN) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Susan Saline who wrote (152)	12/18/2001 3:16:27 PM
From: AV8R	Respond to of 167

News: Following is a press release from Standard & Poor's: NEW YORK (Standard & Poor's) Dec. 18, 2001Standard & Poor's today lowered certain ratings on Providian Financial Corp. and its unit Providian National Bank (see list). The ratings of Providian Capital I as well as the shortterm counterparty rating of Providian National Bank are affirmed. All ratings are removed from CreditWatch, where they were placed with negative implications on Nov. 30, 2001. The outlook is stable. The ratings actions reflect the risks associated with the San Francisco, Calif.based credit card company's efforts to reposition its business away from the Standard market segment. Concerns surrounding the company's deteriorating asset quality, particularly in the Standard portfolio, have been mounting since midyear and have been exacerbated by the news on Nov. 28, 2001, that the company's chief regulator, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, had asked the company's senior management to formalize its commitment to strengthen the capitalization of its primary operating subsidiary, Providian National Bank, to limit receivables growth, review its loss provisioning methodology, and exit the Standard credit card market. Standard & Poor's analysis suggests that the company will have sufficient liquidity through asset sales as well as cash on hand to meet its obligations in the intermediate term. However, the company's longer term prospects are contingent on senior management's ability to significantly reduce its exposure to the company's large portfolio of underperforming Standard loans and, more importantly, growing higher quality loans to restore profitability and preserve the viability of the company. Moreover, management must achieve this goal in a deteriorating economic environment and nervous credit markets. OUTLOOK: STABLE The outlook is premised on what Standard & Poor's believes is a strong likelihood that management will be able to raise liquidity and improve capitalization through various equity sales that will provide it with the room to reposition the company's business focus. However, the current ratings indicate that the risks of such a strategic repositioning in the current environment are high. If implementation problems are encountered and are of a magnitude to suggest that management is not able to balance the pressures of cleaning up old problems and restoring momentum to the business, the outlook could be revised to negative. RATINGS LOWERED AND REMOVED FROM CREDITWATCH TO FROM Providian Financial Corp. Longterm counterparty credit rating B BB Senior debt B BB Subordinated debt CCC+ B Providian National Bank Longterm counterparty credit rating BB BB+ CDs BB/B BB+/B Senior unsecured BB/B BB+/B Subordinated debt B/B BB/B RATINGS AFFIRMED AND REMOVED FROM CREDITWATCH Providian National Bank Shortterm counterparty rating B Providian Capital I Preferred stock CCC (END) DOW JONES NEWS 121801 01:10 PM