MUMBAI, April 9 (Xinhua) -- India's premier international trade funding institution -- Export Import Bank of India (EXIM) has been affirmed Long-Term Issuer Default Rating (IDR) with "BBB-" rating and stable outlook by rating agency - Fitch on Tuesday.

The bank will benefit from timely state support in times of need as it stems from EXIM's unique policy role, strong government linkages and 100 percent state ownership. The Stable Outlook on the IDR mirrors the outlook on the sovereign rating, the Fitch release said.

The Indian government has been regularly infusing capital into the bank including 721.2 million U.S. dollars for the recent year ending March 2019 and has further budgeted an additional 216.3 million U.S. dollars of fresh equity to be injected in FY20.

This has helped it improve its Tier I capital ratio to 11.1 percent by December 2018 from 8.8 percent in March 2018, when a sizeable loss caused a significant deterioration.

Fitch expects the bank's tier 1 ratio to further improve in 2019, considering that a large chunk of capital was injected post December 2018.