RBS chief warns it may have to turn away customers in event of no-deal Brexit
Royal Bank of Scotland’s chief executive Ross McEwan said the bank may have to turn away business customers if there is no Brexit deal.
The bank has sent 150 staff to Amsterdam to set up a new entity to act for its European customers in the event of a no-deal Brexit.
"We're having to put a number of our senior team and our systems and processes to move our European customers across into that entity for our markets business and our corporates,” he told the BBC.
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McEwan said the bank was “preparing for the worst” and still had not received its licences for the operation.
“If we don't get the right licences, and we don't get them in time, that could create major problems for our customers and for the bank,” he said.
He said failure to receive the appropriate licences by the time the UK leaves the EU in March next year could leave RBS unable to provide services to some of its European customers.
"In the next couple of months, we're going to have to make some decisions, to make sure we've got the licences and if we don't, we're going to have to think about which European customers we may not be able to bank."
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This comes as RBS is preparing to hold an extraordinary general meeting to win shareholder support for a share buyback aimed at reducing the government’s stake in the bank.
The state still owns 62.4 per cent of RBS via UK government investments (UKGI), a legacy of the financial crisis when taxpayers bailed out the stricken bank.
A directed buyback – where the bank would buy shares from the government – would coincide with a share placement by UKGI.
RBS would need to get the move approved by a majority of private investors as UKGI would not be able to vote on the issue.
If RBS does receive shareholder approval it would have 12 months to undertake the directed buyback.