The bank announced it was paying bonuses of £2.4bn – up from £2.2bn a year ago – to 140,000 staff across the bank, with investment bankers taking 14 per cent more than they did in 2012 despite recording a fourth quarter loss.
The investment banking division will take a bonus share worth £1.6bn compared with £1.4bn a year ago, even though the investment banking side suffered a loss in the fourth quarter and its annual profits tumbled 37 per cent.
The bank as a whole saw its profits fall to £5.2bn from £7bn.
Icesave row resurrected by £5.6bn lawsuit
British and Dutch authorities have reignited the “controversial dispute” over the collapse of online lender Icesave at the height of the financial crisis in 2008 by filing a lawsuit for up to IKr1,000bn (£5.6bn) against Iceland’s bank guarantee fund, the Financial Times reports.
Iceland’s guarantee scheme, TIF, said yesterday (10 February) that the UK was seeking IKr452bn while the Netherlands wanted IKr104bn. Both countries are also seeking interest and costs in the five-year-old dispute, the FT states.
The dispute stems from money lost by more than 300,000 British and Dutch depositors in high-yielding Icesave accounts marketed by Landsbanki, one of the three big Icelandic banks that collapsed in 2008.
According to the FT, the UK and Dutch governments “chose to reimburse savers through their domestic deposit insurance schemes even though the bank fell under Icelandic jurisdiction”.
CBI warns politics could derail economy
The Confederation of British Industry has warned that political uncertainty surrounding next year’s general election could derail a “fragile economy” in business investment, the Telegraph reports.
While business optimism was finally translating into IT, advertising and research investment, Katja Hall, the CBI’s chief policy director, said political tensions during the build-up to the 2015 election were a potential “mood killer” for investment.
Sir Mike Rake, president of the CBI, warned last month that “politically motivated” anti-business policies by Labour leader Ed Miliband risked holding back the recovery.
According to the Telegraph, the CBI called on MPs to follow-through on pledges to improve infrastructure, as well as implementing “pro-enterprise” and “pro-business” policies that would ensure the recovery remained “rooted”.
Banks to be benchmarked against each other
The Telegraph reports that British banks will be “benchmarked against one another to track their performance”, with lenders expected to publish figures ranging from the number of staff that make whistleblowing complaints, to how many employees are in professional training.
The moves aimed at restoring trust in the financial sector will be overseen by a new as yet unnamed professional body for banks, following the recommendations of a preliminary report by former CBI director general, Sir Richard Lambert.
According to Sir Richard, the unnamed body could be up and running by the end of this year.
Court hears Anglo Irish Bank executives lied
A bankrupt ex-billionaire whose fortune was wiped out by the near-collapse of Anglo Irish Bank told a Dublin court that “executives at the institution assured him the bank was in ‘rude health’ just before it was bailed out by taxpayers”, according to the Guardian.
Sean Quinn allege that the bank’s bosses asked him to stop legal action against them in September 2008 and instead they should “come to a gentlemen’s agreement where we will all live happily ever after”. Mr Quinn added that he had been foolish for getting involved in buying shares in the bank.
Mr Quinn was giving evidence yesterday (10 February) at the trial of three Anglo Irish executives - Sean FitzPatrick, Pat Whelan and William McAteer. The trio have pleaded not guilty to charges that they unlawfully provided finance to 16 individuals including Mr Quinn. The case continues.
Rebound in retail sales
A strong rebound in furniture sales on the back of the recovery in the housing market fuelled the strongest monthly retail sales growth since March 2010, The Mail reports.
Sales figures for January jumped by a better than expected 3.9 per cent according to the British Retail Consortium/KPMG sales monitor. Furniture was the top-performing category, achieving its best growth since April 2006, however the non-food sector saw low levels of growth in the last quarter.
