On July 23, 2015, Volkswagen AG and Dutch company Fleet Investments B.V., which jointly own Dutch bank LeasePlan Corporation N.V., announced their intention to dispose of their stakes to a consortium of investors. We now consider Volkswagen less likely to offer LeasePlan extraordinary support in case of financial need and classify LeasePlan as a nonstrategic part of the VW group. We are therefore lowering our rating on LeasePlan to 'BBB' from 'BBB+', indicating that we no longer modify the rating up by one notch for group support. We are also placing the 'BBB' long-term and 'A-2' short-term ratings on CreditWatch negative to reflect downside risks to the bank's financial profile, particularly its leverage, under the ownership of financial sponsors. At
