The UK Banks: Performance Benchmarking Report highlights how profitability at the UK’s largest banks has suffered at the hands of the Eurozone crisis and the significant costs associated with PPI, the bank levy and regulatory requirements. The overall cost of PPI and other redress payments totalled £5.7bn and the total bank levy charge was £1.3bn.
The big five banks – Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds Banking Group, RBS and Standard Chartered – made combined pre-tax statutory profits of £19.4 billion in 2011, down £2.9 billion on profits reported in 2011. Following a year of aggressive cost cutting and restructuring, including the offloading of non-core businesses, retail banking fared better than investment banking where revenues declined sharply compared with last year.
- Doubts over future profitability at UK banks
- Questions remain over future profitability
- Job losses and further restructuring to be key themes of 2012
- Retail still suffering from PPI and investment banking had a year to forget
- Cost of regulation starting to bite across the board
- Banking - fit for purpose?
- Simplification
- Reshaping investment banks
- Mobile banking – a global future?
