Research Update: Virgin Money UK And Clydesdale Bank Upgraded After Acquisition By Nationwide; Outlook Stable

Nationwide Building Society completed its acquisition of Virgin Money UK (VMUK) on Oct. 1, 2024, after the court sanctioned the scheme of arrangement last week. We view VMUK's status within the new Nationwide group as highly strategic and think VMUK's subgroup will benefit from a higher-rated parent's support. As a result, we have raised the issuer credit rating (ICR) on both the holding company (VMUK) and operating company (Clydesdale Bank PLC) by one notch, and our issue ratings on the hybrid instruments issued by VMUK by two notches. Our stable outlook on VMUK and Clydesdale Bank reflects our view that the new parent will continue to deliver a resilient performance and maintain a robust balance sheet, while mitigating the execution

...To From Issuer Credit Rating (Clydesdale Bank PLC) A/Stable/A-1 A-/Watch Pos/A-2 SACP ### ### Anchor ###+ ###+ Business position Moderate (-1) Moderate (-1) Capital and earnings Adequate (0) Adequate (0) Risk position Adequate (0) Adequate (0) Funding and liquidity Adequate and adequate (0) Adequate and adequate (0) Comparable ratings analysis 0 0 Support +3 +2 ALAC support 0 +2 GRE support 0 0 Group support +3 0 Sovereign support 0 0 Additional factors 0 0...

Research Update