Lloyds Banking Group Leaves Ireland

Lloyds does not intend to prolong its Republic of Ireland banking licence as it ends banking activities within the country, which have led to more than a 1.5 billion pounds loss in the first six months of the year.

From next year, Lloyds will fully transfer Bank of Scotland’s (Ireland) assets, which are currently ing about £25 billion, to its head company balance sheet.
 
Previously this year, Lloyds has already truncated its presence in Ireland as its 44 Halifax branches with around 750 job places were liquidated. The banking division abandonment from Ireland will influence 840 employees. But the change will only leave 36 of them unemployed, as per sources connected with Lloyds.

In its press release published yesterday, Lloyds slammed the prospective of staying in Ireland, having called opportunities of its business “little for scalable growth in the future”.

The Republic of Ireland was one of those worst hit by the financial crisis, especially its banking industry, which needed billions of euros of government aid to maintain existence. The Irish real estate market is showing no signs of recovery and that is why Irish banks continue to carry record losses. Lloyds is not an exception: almost half (43%) of its lending portfolio (little less than £27bn) are problem loans. Despite this, the British largest financial holdings perform well, gradually getting rid of bad assets and having risk-free major clients.

The departure of the bank will leave 150,000 individuals who have a current account searching for a new bank, but Lloyds guarantees a “smooth transition” and all possible help to sustain that.