On March 13, 2009, Standard&Poor's Ratings Services revised its outlook on U.K. mortgage and savings provider Nationwide Building Society to negative from stable. At the same time, the 'A+/A-1' counterparty credit ratings were affirmed. The outlook revision principally reflects our expectation that Nationwide's profitability will face growing pressure during the U.K. recession. Nationwide's activities are overwhelmingly focused on the U.K. Its loan portfolio has shown relative resilience to date, reflecting its bias toward prime residential mortgages (74% of customer lending at Sept. 30, 2008) and what we view as its relatively disciplined underwriting standards. However, with unemployment now rising significantly and house prices continuing to decline, we expect that Nationwide, like peers, will likely experience a material increase
