Santander becomes latest bank to cut mortgage rates amid falling inflation August 14, 2023 Santander has become the latest high street lender to reduce the rates of its mortgage deals, following a stream of other cuts by fellow banks last week, in a signal of hope for prospective buyers. On Monday, the bank cut its selected residential purchase and remortgage fixed rates by between 0.05 per cent and 0.29 [...]
Co-operative Bank picks up £479m Sainsbury mortgage portfolio amid speculation over banking M&A August 11, 2023 The Co-operative Bank has bought the mortgage portfolio of Sainsbury’s Bank for £464m as speculation over the future of the UK’s mid-sized lenders continues. The portfolio contains around 3,500 customers and is worth nearly £480m. The deal’s completion comes after months of negotiations, with reports earlier in the year suggesting talks between the two had [...]
Mortgage and rent payments ‘difficult’ for almost 40 per cent of Brits August 11, 2023 Some 38 per cent of Brits have confessed to finding it difficult to afford their rent or mortgage payments over the past month, as the cost of living crisis continues to wreak havoc on the public’s personal finances. This figure was around 29 per cent in early August 2022, new figures from the ONS show, [...]
Analysis: Wilko collapse is the Woolworths of this financial crisis August 10, 2023 The collapse of Woolworths was described as “the first domino of physical retail Armageddon.” Although it might not justify that epithet, the collapse of Wilko shows which way the wind is now blowing.
Arrears continue to rise as higher rates pour pain onto borrowers August 10, 2023 Arrears continued rising in the second quarter as customers struggled with soaring repayment costs, new data shows. According to figures from industry body UK Finance, there were 81,900 homeowner mortgages in arrears of more than 2.5 per cent in the second quarter, seven per cent more than the previous quarter. Within this, 30,940 mortgages were [...]
OneSavings Bank profits slump as customers race to refinance mortgages August 10, 2023 Profit at OneSavings Bank (OSB) Group slumped in the first half of the year as the lender dealt with a £180m hit from changing customer behaviour. Pretax profit at the FTSE-250 listed specialist bank fell 71 per cent to £76.7m from £268.1m in the same period last year. The bank announced a dividend of 10.2p, [...]
Mark Kleinman’s column: WANdisco fiasco, Co-op auction and Chelsea’s misfires August 10, 2023 Mark Kleinman is Sky News’ City Editor and is the man that gets the City talking in his fortnightly City A.M. column. It’s payback time WANdisco? More like WANfiasco. Within weeks of the AIM-listed data software company letting it be known that it was solidifying its ambitions of pursuing a US stock market listing, the [...]
Rents likely to continue rising sharply despite cost of living crisis August 10, 2023 Rents are likely to continue rising sharply despite the cost of living crisis, surveyors are warning. Property professionals’ expectations that rents will rise in the next few months are at the strongest levels seen so far this century, the findings from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) indicate. A net balance of 63 per [...]
Brokers predict ‘mortgage price war’ as lenders including HSBC and Nationwide cut rates again August 9, 2023 Brokers have suggested there could be a “mortgage price war” as lenders continue to reduce rates amid hopes inflation is finally on the way down. Nationwide reduced prices on some of its fixed products by up to 0.55 percentage points while HSBC reduced rates by up to 0.2 percentage points. TSB also lowered rates by [...]
European bank shares fall after shock 40 per cent Italian windfall tax on excess profits August 8, 2023 Shares in European banks fell after the Italian government announced a surprise windfall tax on banks who have seen bumper profits thanks to higher interest rates. Late last night Giorgia Meloni’s populist government agreed to impose a one-off 40 per cent tax on extra-profits, defining extra-profits as when net interest income has grown beyond three [...]