Lloyds’ lock-up on St James’s Place ends November 24, 2013 THE FORMAL lock-up on Lloyds’ holding of St James’ Place shares expires today, removing one obstacle to the bank selling more stock in the wealth management unit. When the bank sold £450m worth of stock in May it agreed not to sell any more for another 180 days – a lock-up period which runs out [...]
Brand Index: Account switching means banks must fight to stay current September 17, 2013 THIS WEEK, new rules took effect that will allow the UK’s 46m current account holders to switch banks in seven days. According to 2011 research from the Banking Commission, the average customer stayed with the same bank for 26 years, but with switching now easier than ever before, we could be entering a new era [...]
Lloyds sale set for green light from regulator September 10, 2013 REGULATORS are set to rule that Lloyds’ proposals to sell hundreds of branches will boost competition to an acceptable degree, accelerating the chances of an imminent sale of the part-state-owned bank. It is thought the Office of Fair Trading (OFT), which is examining how disposals will affect competition in the banking sector, will approve of [...]
Lloyds sells Scottish Widows to Aberdeen in £560m deal November 18, 2013 Lloyds Banking Group has announced this morning that it has agreed to sell Scottish Widows Investment Partnership (SWIP), its asset management business, to Aberdeen Asset Management, for an initial consideration of £560m, paid for by the issue of nearly 132m new Aberdeen shares. Aberdeen shares are soaring on the news this morning, up over 14 [...]
City Moves for 15 November 2013 | Who’s switching jobs November 14, 2013 Sullivan & Worcester The law firm has announced the hire of Mark Norris as a finance partner in its London office. He was most recently at Squire Sanders, where he was a banking and finance partner. Norris has previously held various roles at Simmons & Simmons and Clifford Chance. PwC Michael Spiteri has joined the professional services [...]
Bank of England appoints new finance director from Barclays October 4, 2013 The Bank of England has appointed Ralph Coates as its new finance director. Ralph succeeds Warwick Jones, who retired from the Bank in June. He'll start the job on 4 November. Charlotte Hogg, chief operating officer said: I am delighted to announce the appointment of Ralph Coates as the Bank’s new Finance Director. Ralph will [...]
Why capital rules could limit the impact of new competition in banking September 9, 2013 THE NEW TSB bank was finally launched yesterday. The spin-off of 631 branches and 4.6m customers from Lloyds means that the UK now has the first new major competitor to the existing banks since the start of the financial crisis. And when RBS spins off 315 of its branches, Britain will have a further mid-size [...]
Banks’ PPI crisis eases at last as complaints fall October 16, 2013 THE WORST of the payments protection insurance (PPI) crisis appears to be over for Britain’s banks as the City watchdog yesterday published numbers showing a fall in complaints. A total of 2.9m complaints were made in the first six months of 2013, according to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), down 500,000 on the previous six-month [...]
The Royal Mail should present a fair valuation for investors September 24, 2013 BUSINESS minister Michael Fallon has certainly added some missing “zip” in promoting UK industry and commerce. Despite union opposition, his infectious enthusiasm, together with Royal Mail chief executive Moya Greene’s visionary management, has given the scheduled floatation of Royal Mail in October every chance of success. Governments are notoriously bad managers of commercial enterprises, so [...]
Financial services complaints fall by 500,000 in six months as Barclays receives over 370,000 October 16, 2013 Consumer complaints to the financial conduct authority (FCA) have dropped by 500,000 between the second half of 2012 and the first half of 2013. Ian McConnell, financial services partner at PwC, says that the fall is "encouraging" and shows "that the issues faced by the financial services industry are being dealt with." McConnell says the [...]