Banks are back: How the UK’s banking sector got its mojo back as dividend payments rise March 26, 2015 The UK’s banks are back on form and could be the best place to invest for good and growing dividends. British banks such as Lloyds, HSBC and Barclays were once the best places to invest for solid dividends. Ten years ago, banks provided a quarter of all dividends in the UK market, according to figures [...]
No end for PPI claims as cutoff date is ruled out February 4, 2014 CUTTING short the PPI scandal by imposing a deadline on compensation claims would hurt victims of the crisis, Martin Wheatley said yesterday. Banks are still unveiling higher and higher estimates of the final cost of the redress payments as the flow of claims from customers shows no sign of ending. But the chief of the [...]
No dividend for Lloyds as PPI bill nears £10bn February 3, 2014 LLOYDS set aside another £1.8bn for PPI compensation claims and £130m for interest rate swaps redress yesterday. The bills wipe out any hope of a 2013 dividend for shareholders, while regulators are considering letting the bank pay dividends at “a modest level” from the second half of 2014. The lender has now set aside £9.8bn [...]
London Report: Lloyds PPI news leads the FTSE to six-week low February 3, 2014 BRITAIN’S top shares extended a recent slide yesterday, slipping firmly into negative territory after disappointing US data, with Lloyds leading banks lower after its latest update. The FTSE 100 was down 44.78 points at 6,465.66 by the close, a fall of 0.7 per cent, dropping to new six-week lows after last week’s 2.3 per cent [...]
Lloyds to resume dividend payments as it pledges £1.8bn more for PPI February 3, 2014 Lloyds Banking Group has just announced that it’s set aside a further £1.8bn as compensation for so-called payment protection insurance misselling. That’ll mean the state-owned bank will have laid aside a total to the tune of almost £10bn. It's also made further provision of £130m regarding the sale of interest rate hedging products to some [...]
RBS share price starts down despite first-half profit increase of 93 per cent August 1, 2014 The Royal Bank of Scotland shrugged off PPI write downs to record a huge jump in profit before tax. The figures will come as no real surprise as RBS gave accurate guidance on its first-half expectations a week ago and saw its share price rocket as a result. This explains why the markets have not [...]
HSBC share price falls despite revealing lower-than-expected forex provision November 3, 2014 Shares in HSBC Holdings fell this morning after it revealed it has earmarked $378m (£236m) in provisions for the FCA's probe into its involvement in the foreign exchange scandal, lower than the £400m expected. The provision is the smallest sum announced by a bank so far. The group, which this morning posted pre-tax profits [...]
The government won’t sell Lloyds shares before the next election August 14, 2014 There will be no sale of the taxpayer's Lloyds shares before the next election. George Osborne has indicated that there will be no sale of share to the general public between now and next May, which is unsurprising given the recent performance of Lloyds' shares. The government would deal itself a significant political blow if [...]
German PPI down in October as energy prices fall November 20, 2013 The price change for industrial products in Germany missed expectations this morning, falling 0.2 per cent in October, following a consensus of no change and after September's 0.3 per cent increase. Year-on-year, the index was down 0.7 per cent. In September, the annual rate of change all over was –0.5 per cent. While prices of [...]
HSBC chairman wants delay to ringfence rules August 3, 2014 BRITAIN’S biggest banks could face two expensive shake-ups instead of one, the head of HSBC has warned, because the new competition probe is taking place at the same time as banks divide themselves up with the incoming ringfence. HSBC chairman Douglas Flint has written to chancellor George Osborne, asking him to push back the introduction [...]