We’ll move our cash out of UK: RBS chief

Bank ‘cannot wait any longer for Brexit decision’

THE boss of RBS last night suggested the bank could begin moving ‘tens of billions of pounds’ of business out of the UK because of fears over Brexit.

Chief executive Ross McEwan said the bank – which was bailed out with £45billion of taxpayers’ money during the financial crisis – could not afford to wait much longer to see what deal Theresa May agreed with the EU.

He said the Edinburgh-based firm would step up moves to transfer corporate clients to its Amsterdam office because a ‘hard Brexit’ now appeared more likely.

RBS officials said what Mr McEwan was talking about would affect a small number of larger Western European corporate customers with complex, crossborder products.

Despite regular sales of RBS shares, the bank remains 62 per cent owned by the taxpayer. But a Treasury source said the department would not be intervening in the row, saying the bank was managed at ‘arms length’.

‘We are not in the business of running banks,’ the source said.

Mr McEwan made the comments at an event in Edinburgh on Tuesday. Speaking to reporters he said the firm has a licence in the Netherlands and has the ‘systems in place’ to move business across.

‘My biggest fear is, if we don’t get messaging [on the Brexit deal] soon we are going to have to start moving as though it’s a hard Brexit because I can’t wait.

‘I have to work with customers, I have to start disrupting customers – either moving them off the books, selling them or moving them to our Amsterdam operation because we just won’t have time.’

He said the customers are ‘big businesses’ and ‘we have to get them ready’, adding that ‘I am worried about it’.

He added: ‘The bank has to plan for the worst. We hope and pray that we get something better.’

If it comes to March, when Britain formally leaves the European Union, and there is no detailed Brexit plan, then ‘tens of billions of pounds’ could be moved to Amsterdam.

He said that leaving the EU does not need to impact on the bank’s profitability, but said if there is a ‘hard Brexit and a real drop-off in the economy’ then ‘that starts to impact our business’.

Tory MP Andrew Bridgen said: ‘The British Government and the British people should expect more loyalty from a bank which was bailed out at great expense by the taxpayer due to neglect by their then chief executive.’