Article 139

1.  Where a credit assessment exists for a specific issuing programme or facility to which the item constituting the exposure belongs, this credit assessment shall be used to determine the risk weight to be assigned to that item.

2.  Where no directly applicable credit assessment exists for a certain item, but a credit assessment exists for a specific issuing programme or facility to which the item constituting the exposure does not belong or a general credit assessment exists for the issuer, then that credit assessment shall be used in either of the following cases:

(a)    it produces a higher risk weight than would otherwise be the case and the exposure in question ranks pari passu or junior in all respects to the specific issuing program or facility or to senior unsecured exposures of that issuer, as relevant;

(b)    it produces a lower risk weight and the exposure in question ranks pari passu or senior in all respects to the specific issuing programme or facility or to senior unsecured exposures of that issuer, as relevant.

In all other cases, the exposure shall be treated as unrated.

3.  Paragraphs 1 and 2 are not to prevent the application of Article 129.

4.  Credit assessments for issuers within a corporate group cannot be used as credit assessment of another issuer within the same corporate group.