GCR Affirms Access Bank AA/A1+ With Stable Outlook
GCR Ratings (GCR) has affirmed Access Bank Plc’s national scale long and short-term issuer ratings of AA(NG) and A1+(NG), respectively, while the outlook is stable.
The ratings consider the bank’s enduring leadership of its primary market – Nigeria in terms of scale and international diversity, as well as its positioning as a strong trade partner across Africa while broadly maintaining good credit fundamentals on a consolidated basis.
GCR said the bank remains the largest subsidiary of Access Holdings Plc (the Holdco); hence, the analytical considerations and consequently the ratings reflect the creditworthiness of the consolidated Holdco.
Access’ business profile is underpinned by a strong domestic market position as Nigeria’s largest lender, unique trade finance capabilities through its strategic presence at key global trade hubs across Africa, Europe and Asia.
This includes a strong governance and risk management factors. Ratings analysts stated that despite the bank’s exposure to the oil and gas sector (which declined to 8.8% of gross loans as of December 2025 from 17.6% as of December 2024) Access has over time built a good ESG risk culture which continues to evolve, distinguishing the bank from rated peers.
Its funding and liquidity remain positive to the ratings, driven by a stable funding base comprising mainly of customer deposits.
During financial year 2025, the bank’s interbank deposits fell sharply by 59.9% to NGN3.7 trillion, signalling a positive structural shift toward retail funding.
The management believes this shift is sustainable as it reflects the benefits of established relationships across corporates and the public sector which are starting to materialise.
On the back of stronger Naira and foreign currency deposits, management plans to further reduce reliance on market funding, which currently accounts for under 3.0% of customer deposits.
Over the next 12 to 18 months, GCR said the bank will focus on achieving lower funding costs by trading off long-term funding, which is stable but costly given interest rate risk.
Hence, rating analysts do expect the long-term debt profile to change over the next 12 months, and given the abundance of customer deposits, no anticipated impact on funding stability and mix.
Also, GCR said it expects the bank’s liquidity ratio to remain above 40% over the outlook period, per management’s guidance.
Access’ overall risk profile is considered positive to the ratings on the back of the bank’s moderate risk appetite reflected by cautious lending which has led to more investment securities than loans in the asset mix over the last 24 months.
Curtailing lending growth has helped preserve asset quality, as the non-performing loans (NPLs) ratio has remained under 3.5% amid the challenging operating environment over the last three years.
However, exposure to sovereign risk increased significantly in tandem, as the bulk of investment securities is government debt.
The termination of regulatory forbearance on certain loans led to a spike in impairment charges to NGN523.5 billion in financial 2025, up from NGN245.3 billion in financial 2024.
However, NPLs only marginally increased to 3.0%. Sustained cautious lending, as well as prioritising efficiency over scale, should preserve asset quality over the outlook period. Relative to rated peers, the bank’s capital adequacy is modest, mostly due to its rapid growth over the last decade.
As of December 2025, the total regulatory capital adequacy ratio (CAR) increased slightly to 21.0% from 20.0% as of December 2024, reflecting the impact of retained profit growth in financial 2025, offset by an increase in risk-weighted assets due to the termination of regulatory forbearance. Similarly, the GCR core capital ratio increased to 12.4% from 11.7% in financial 2025.
Over the outlook period, ratings analysts expect marginal improvements in core capitalisation, driven by internal capital generation as the bank consolidates and achieves scale efficiencies; furthermore, sustained growth of the international and pan-African franchise could translate into tangible gains in capital adequacy.
The outlook is stable because GCR ratings analysts said they expect key rating factors to remain broadly within the assigned rating level, and any positive changes to be balanced by the negative triggers.
