DBRS said today it believes the additional exposure that TD Bank has taken on to help finance the BCE Inc. takeover does not affect its credit rating.

Yesterday, TD announced that it had a $3.3 billion participation in a $34.3 billion credit facility and that it has provided a $500 million equity bridge facility to a group of institutional investors in support of their bid to acquire BCE.

The rating agency says that the exposure is “at the high end of our tolerance level for single-name exposures relative to capital levels and earnings before loans losses”.

“However, the additional exposure does not impact the credit risk profile sufficiently to impact TD’s current ratings,” it concludes.

“A key reason for this opinion is that DBRS anticipates the increase of single name and industry concentration risk will be partially mitigated by the expectation that the bank will actively manage down the risk, including syndicating a large portion of these commitments,” it adds. “Additionally, DBRS believes TD’s experience in the underwriting and syndication of corporate loans, and its ongoing risk-management practices will contribute to controlling the risk.”