S&P cuts outlook for 7 UK banks

NEW YORK

The outlooks of seven banks in the U.K. were revised down due to the country's decision to leave the EU, Standard & Poor's (S&P) announced Thursday.

Barclays, Clydesdale Banks, HSBC Holdings, Lloyds Banking Group, Nationwide Building Society and Santander UK Group Holdings were cut to "negative" from "stable" while the outlook of The Royal Bank of Scotland Group was lowered to "stable" from "positive."

Meanwhile, the banks’ ratings remained unchanged.

"Brexit has increased the risks of adverse economic developments in the U.K. As a result, we now see a negative trend for U.K. banking industry economic risk," the global ratings agency said in a statement.

"We see at least a one-in-three likelihood that the economic risk assessment may worsen over the next two years," S&P said, and it expects consumer confidence and credit demand to reduce in "the near term."

After the Brexit vote June 23, S&P lowered the U.K.'s credit rating to "AA" from "AAA" while keeping its outlook "negative" June 27.