ECB tells banks to pay 12 percent more for their supervision

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - The European Central Bank will ask banks to pay 12 percent more in supervisory fees this year, in part to cover the cost of Brexit related preparations and the cost of a regular stress test, it said on Monday.

Bank will be asked to pay 474.8 million euros in fees this year, up from 425 million euros a year earlier, and the ECB plans to spend 502.5 million euros on supervision, also using cash left over from 2017, it said in a statement.

The ECB argued that several factors accounted for the increase, which follows a 10 percent rise a year earlier.

"These factors include the United Kingdom's withdrawal from the EU (Brexit) and the costs associated with the ECB's involvement in conducting the European Banking Authority's biennial supervisory stress tests for significant banks in 2018," the ECB said in a statement.

(Reporting by Balazs Koranyi; Editing by Alison Williams)