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’Le poison de la rumeur
Predictable really.
The investigation into the Societe Generale sell-off looks like it could quickly descend into farce.
Over the weekend Le Monde was forced to defend itself — in a front page comment no less — against accusations that a 12-part fictional series titled,
Short-selling fairies
Charts via short-selling information specialists Data Explorers, incorporating a gauge of securities lending in both the financials currently subject to the short-selling bans, and in their markets.
Compare and contrast:
Lloyds impaired
It seemed too good to last… and it was.
Lloyds Banking Group has bucked the trend in the UK banks sector and reported a disappointing set of half year figures.
At pixel time the shares were down 4.4p at 37.25p.
HBOS uncovered
What’s this that has quietly appeared in the correspondence section of the Treasury Select Committee website?
It’s only a letter from FSA chairman Adair Turner announcing plans to publish (yes publish) a report into the downfall of fat bloke finance house HBOS.
Lloyds – the 90 per cent LTV bank
Sir Victor also insists that enough due diligence was done on the deal, in two tranches and that the risks in HBOS’s property portfolio were understood. The problem was the speed with which the economy collapsed,
HBOS remembered
We said earlier on Monday that only one bank came off badly in the interim report from the Independent Commission on Banking.
We were wrong.
There’s another bank that comes in for some criticism.
The Bank of England’s very own, very secret liquidity
Emergency Liquidity Assistance (ELA) — or short-term liquidity programmes courtesy of national European central banks — has made headlines recently.
Not least because Irish banks are supposedly using over €50bn of the stuff.
Dear Sir John
Which anarchist added this to the list of public responses sent to the UK’s Independent Banking Commission? (H/T to the FT’s Paul Davies):
While again emphasising that this is a personal view, I do believe that in the interests of competition,
Lloyds gets the red pen treatment
First the good news. House broker UBS remains extremely on bullish Lloyds Banking Group.
We remain convinced that the group can, by 2013, deliver a mid- to high-teens RoE on a capital base and net asset value considerably higher than the current level.
Further reading (for the IBC)
More bedtime reading for the UK’s Independent Banking Commission; this time from research house Autonomous.
The report was referenced in Tuesday’s Wall Street Journal as a curtain raiser to the publication on Friday of the IBC’s ‘Issues Paper’.
Homework for the Independent Banking Commission
Here’s some reading for the UK’s Independent Banking Commission, ahead of its first public appearance on Friday.
It’s an in-depth report from JP Morgan on the profitability of Lloyds Banking Group’s retail operations.
So, what was that Lloyds profit again?
Was it £1.6bn, £1.3bn, or £280m?
You can literally take your pick of Lloyds’ pre-tax interim profits.
The Banking Group reported its 2010 interim earnings on Wednesday. And in grand Lloyds’ tradition ever since its 2009 acquisition of HBOS,
Snap news
Breaking pre-market news on Monday,
- Lloyds sells HBOS integrated finance division to Coller Capital – statement.
- BP says Gulf of Mexico clean up costs now $3.12bn – statement.
- Travis Perkins agrees 435.8p/£560m offer for BSS Group – statement.
Eric Daniels no longer the last man standing
Yep, the CEO of Lloyds, is going to waive his 2009 bonus of £2.33m.
Not that he had much choice in the matter after his opposite number at RBS, Stephen Hester, announced on Monday morning that he would forfeit an estimated £1.6m in bonus,
Hurry! The Peter Cummings sale has started!
Re-started, actually.
Mark Kleinman at Sky.com had news on Wednesday, that Lloyds Banking Group is auctioning off a portfolio holdings in scores of British companies, together worth something in the region of £400m.
Blanchflower accuses BoE’s King
David Blanchflower, the former Bank of England policymaker, has accused Bank governor Mervyn King of keeping “vital” information from him at the height of the financial crisis, reports the Daily Telegraph.
Lloyds investors ‘mugged’ over HBOS
Lloyds TSB shareholders were “mugged” when the bank agreed to buy HBOS last year without knowing that the stricken lender was being propped up by a secret £25bn loan, Jim Cousins, a Labour MP, said on Wednesday.
Bank secretly lent RBS, HBOS £61.6bn
Royal Bank of Scotland and HBOS came within minutes of closing cashpoints and normal business operations, the Bank of England confirmed on Tuesday, revealing that it extended £61.6bn in emergency funds to the banks in October last year.
The Bank of England’s £61.6bn HBOS, RBS rescue
We finally have the details of the emergency liquidity assistance, or ELA, provided by the Bank of England to RBS and HBOS at the peak of the crisis last year.
The figures, which were deemed too sensitive to be released at the time,
Call off the search, ITV edition (update)
It’s over.
As the FT revealed overnight, ITV has finally found a chairman: failed MP former Asda and Energis boss Archie Norman.
And the broadcaster is making the most of Norman’s CV, with a detailed biography in Wednesday’s press release:
Probing HBOS
It’s right there — on page 114 — in case you missed it. The full prospectus for Lloyds Banking Group’s heroic capital raising, finally confirms the following:
FSA supervisory review into historical HBOS disclosures
The FSA is conducting a supervisory review into the accuracy and completeness of financial disclosures made by HBOS in connection with its capital raisings in 2008,
Why Lloyds won’t be paying its TV licence this year
Some of you may have caught Bank of England governor Mervyn King’s appearance in the BBC Two documentary ‘The Love of Money,’ on Thursday evening.
If not, and if you are located in the UK, you can catch it here on BBC iPlayer.
When Goldman met Lloyds…
. . . on Thursday night.
GS meeting with management. Key takeaway: “everything is proceeding according to plan with regards to the [UK Government's asset protection scheme], however, the board will always look out for shareholders and should an alternative,
Laughing Lloyds
Lloyds shares were up 5.5 per cent in early trade on Wednesday, even after the bank posted higher than expected impairments on bad debt.
From the statement:
Impairments in the first half were £13.4 billion,
UK house prices fall
That’s right, 0.5 per cent in June, according to the latest Halifax House Price index.
However, analysts had forecasts a fall of 0.7 per cent and Martin Ellis, Halifax’s housing economist, reckons this decline is further evidence of ‘bottoming out’.
Lex: Lloyds Banking Group
Whoever becomes the new chairman of Lloyds, the first thing he should do is get rid of the chief executive, Eric Daniels.
The current arrangement , which allows Mr Daniels to escape his share of responsibility,
Working knowledge of reckless leverage essential
Andy Hornby, the former chief executive of HBOS, the stricken bank, is poised to be named as the boss of Alliance Boots, Britain’s most indebted biggest pharmacy chain.
Mr Hornby, who stepped down from HBOS after the bank’s part- nationalisation and rescue takeover by Lloyds TSB last October,
Lloyds eyes sale of HBOS unit stakes
Lloyds Banking Group is considering selling off stakes in about 60 companies as it integrates its controversial acquisition of HBOS. Lloyds has brought in UBS to evaluate selling the stakes built up by HBOS’s controversial integrated finance unit,
Risk Factor 1.3
Lloyds Banking Group will publish the prospectus for its £4bn share placing on Wednesday afternoon and all eyes will be on paragraph 1.3. It covers potential changes Lloyds could be forced to make in order to get EU State Aid Approval for this share placing,