Standard & Poor’s has ceased rating covered bonds issued by Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce before the introduction of Canadian legislation at the issuer’s request, the rating agency said on Friday upon affirming and withdrawing its AAA rating of the programme.

CIBC in July inaugurated a new legislative covered bond programme and is no longer issuing off its previous, structured programme, which was backed by mortgages carrying a Canada Mortgage & Housing Corporation (CMHC) insurance – its Global Public Sector Covered Bond Programme.

S&P’s affirmation came after a review of the programme at the end of December.

“At the issuer’s request, we subsequently withdrew the ratings on the programme and all related series of covered bonds,” said the rating agency. “At the time of the withdrawal, the outlook was stable.”

The programme was classified as having asset-liability mismatch risk of “low” and in S&P’s Category 2. The programme was therefore eligible for up to six notches of uplift over the issuer’s rating, of A+, meaning that it had two notches of unused uplift.