Changing Perceptions!
How fast one's perception of Canadian banks can change. In 2008/09 the Canadian banks were saved by not having Canadian federal banking regulations changed fast enough to allow Canadian banks to copy the US banks packaging and flogging of worthless mortgage paper crap on unsuppecting customers worldwide. This is a complicated topic. All I'm saying, is be very careful about holding/investing in Canadian banks this time around in the huge equity bear market I see coming. I never thought Royal Bank would be the first to be downgraded.

Citigroup and Bank of America, which have struggled to fully recover from the financial crisis, were among the hardest hit. After two-notch downgrades, their credit ratings stand just two levels above junk, a sign of the difficult business conditions they face. Banking executives argued on Thursday that the new ratings did not reflect the safeguards and changes that they had put in place in recent years.

The European Banks are a basket case. If they marked to market all the soverign debt of surrounding countries they hold (Greece, Portugal, Spain, and now Italy); they are under water also know as bankruptcy (assets - liabilities = less than zero).
By contagion this will spread to North American banks in the coming equity bear market. What we are watching is when overnight interbank lending freezes up.