Home > Mortgages > Mortgage Products
RBS reveals £44m quarterly loss
Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) has announced a pre-tax loss of £44m for the first quarter of the year, after bad debts rocketed close to £5bn.
The loss compares to a profit of £479m for the corresponding period last year.
At the same time, the bank, which is 70 per cent-owned by the government, revealed that impairment losses and credit market write-downs totalled almost £4.93bn for the first three months of the year.
RBS chief executive Stephen Hester said that while the short-term outlook remained challenging, he was confident that RBS would be able to "rebuild shareholder value over the next three to five years".
However, Hester added: "We expect credit conditions to continue to deteriorate over the next few quarters... and that there will be a slow-down in financial market activity compared with the very buoyant conditions seen in Q1.
"Some commentators are beginning to talk about economic recovery; we remain cautious and continue to plan and manage our businesses in the full expectation that both 2009 and 2010 will be very tough years for RBS."
Meanwhile, the group's UK retail banking profits fell 63 per cent to £172m. This was the result of impairment having risen 58 per cent to £447m.
However, UK current accounts did rise by 3 per cent over the first quarter. UK savings accounts also increased by 15 per cent over the same period, while UK own-brand insurance policies rose 5 per cent.
