(MENAFN – Arab News) The Banker magazine announced through its Top 1000 World Banks listing for its July 2012 publication that the National Commercial Bank (NCB) tops the banks in the Middle East in terms of solvency Tier 1 Capital, which is one of the most important criterion for measuring the strength of financial positions of banks and banking institutions.

In addition to attaining this prominent position among the leading banks in Saudi Arabia, the GCC and the Middle East as per the core capital criteria, the international ranking of NCB has also improved from 121st position to the 116th position for the current year‚ among 1,000 banks covered by The Banker’s listing.

Abdulkareem Abu Alnasr, CEO of NCB, reiterated that the bank’s upgrading of its international ranking illustrates its financial strength and healthy liquidity, and a recognition of its leadership not only in the banking industry in the Kingdom but also in the financial services sector at the national and regional levels.

He added that the strength of the bank was not limited to financial solvency and the size of assets alone, but are a result of its leading position in all of its core segments and products, delivery of excellent customer service, continuous paying attention to strong governance, and investing and developing talents.

Alnasr said that despite the challenges faced by the financial institutions regionally and globally over the past two years such ranking reflects the bank’s ability to maintain a strong financial position, quality of its assets and high liquidity.

He added that NCB enjoys financial solvency and a solid capital base that have qualified it to earn recently the financial rating at A+ category with a stable outlook from the Standard Poor’s according to its new classification methodology, which aimed to compare the credit rating of banks at a global level.