Moody's lowered the outlooks on Hongkong & Shanghai Banking Corp. Ltd. and Hang Seng Bank Ltd. to negative from stable, given the pressure on the banks' stand-alone credit profiles.

The rating agency said Dec. 17 that it affirmed the banks' long- and short-term deposit ratings at Aa2 and P-1, respectively.

The lenders' baseline credit assessments and adjusted baseline credit assessments were also affirmed at "a1." HSBC's long-term issuer rating was also affirmed at Aa3.

Further, Moody's also lowered the outlook on HSBC's Singapore, Sydney and New Zealand branches to negative from stable.