Lloyds swings to loss as it sets aside extra £2.4bn for bad loans July 30, 2020 UK banking giant Lloyds swung to a £600m pre-tax loss for the first half of the year today as coronavirus cost it an extra £2.4bn. The provision for loan losses was bigger than the £1.5bn analysts had anticipated. It took total provisions for the first half of the year to £3.8bn. Read more: Barclays braces [...]
BoE hires Accenture in £150m deal to overhaul payments system July 30, 2020 The Bank of England has hired IT consulting firm Accenture to refresh a key part of the UK’s crucial payments system in a deal worth up to £150m. The firm will overhaul the real-time gross settlement (RTGS) service, the backbone of the country’s huge payments system. RTGS settles an average £685bn of payments each working [...]
Does Covid-19 mark the beginning of the end for cash? July 29, 2020 Many European countries were already moving away from cash transactions and the pandemic will only speed up this trend. The Covid-19 crisis has changed our daily lives in multiple ways and accelerated a number of trends that were already in place. For many of us, one obvious change is that the need to use cash [...]
UK pension scheme invests £5.5bn into ‘environmentally friendly strategies’ July 29, 2020 Britain’s largest pension scheme Nest has pledged to tighten its climate change policy with an investment of £5.5bn into environmentally friendly strategies. The government-backed scheme said it would decarbonise its £12bn investment portfolio in a bid to tackle climate change. Nest said it aims to be “net-zero” across its investments by 2050 or earlier, with [...]
Coronavirus pushes Santander to €11bn loss July 29, 2020 Santander suffered a record loss of €11bn (£10bn) in its latest half-year, it revealed today, as coronavirus provisions tanked its bottom line. The figures A massive €12.6bn impairment relating to coronavirus meant Santander swung to a €10.8bn loss for the first half of 2020. Underlying profit before tax halved to €3.8bn year on year. And [...]
UK mortgage approvals beat expectations as housing market reopens July 29, 2020 UK mortgage approvals beat expectations and rocketed in June as the housing market reopened from the coronavirus lockdown, the latest figures have shown. The number of mortgages approved by UK banks rose to 40,000 in June after May’s record crash to just 9,300, the Bank of England said today. Analysts had predicted a rise to [...]
Barclays braces for pandemic blow with extra £1.6bn cushion July 29, 2020 Barclays has set aside £1.6bn to insulate itself against further loan losses in the coronavirus-hit second quarter of 2020, it revealed today, a higher sum than analysts expected. Bank forecasts had pointed to a £1.42bn total but the £1.6bn figure for April to June brings Barclays’ total provisions to £3.7bn. That sum could reach £5.79bn [...]
Bank of England could extend bank dividends suspension July 28, 2020 The Bank of England will weigh up whether its request that banks do not pay out dividends or buy back their own shares should be extended beyond the end of the year, it said today. It came as the European Central Bank (ECB) extended its recommendation that banks do not pay dividends until January 2021. [...]
The Financial Promotion of Cryptoassets – Keeping the Virtual Cat Out of the Regulatory Bag? July 28, 2020 It is a sign of the times that a consultation by the UK’s financial regulators that does not mention COVID-19 is a rarity. However, apart from a single passing nod to the pandemic, HM Treasury launched two consultations last week on proposals to alter how financial promotions are regulated in the UK. Whilst the Cryptoassets [...]
BA owner IAG mulls €2.75bn raise by ‘end of summer’ July 24, 2020 British Airways owner IAG is mulling for a share issue worth up to £2.75bn (£2.4bn) at the end of the summer. The plans to raise equity come as the airline group takes steps to shore up its finances in light of the coronavirus pandemic, which has battered the global aviation sector. In a regulatory notice [...]