Lloyds puts 600 UK branches up for sale
A substantial part of the UK banking network will change hands in the coming days as Lloyds Banking Group starts an auction of branches
Sell-off: Potential buyers of the branches will receive approaches
Over the coming days, Wall Street invetsment banking giants Citigroup and JP Morgan will begin approaching potential buyers of 600 Lloyds branches, which the bailed-out lender is being forced to sell following its taxpayer rescue in 2008.
Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Money, National Australia Bank and a new venture headed by Lloyds of London chairman Lord Levene are seen as the most likely acquirers.
On top of the branches, Lloyds will have to offload around a fifth of its mortgage book and retail deposits to satisfy European Union state bailout and competition rules.
Together the assets on the block constitute Britain's seventh largest lender.
New chief executive, António Horta-Osório, has until the end of 2013 to complete the sale but analysts say a deal could be done by this Christmas. It is understood Citigroup and JP Morgan have agreed to provide a loan of as much as £20bn to expedite a sale.
Horta-Osorio put a moratorium on further Lloyds branch closures on his first day in the job at the start of this month.
His new strategy for the taxpayer-backed mega-bank will be made public in four months' time, but no more specific closures will be announced before the end of this year.
Lloyds is the UK's largest bank group in terms of retail customers, but has closed seven Halifax, 14 Lloyds TSB and 11 Bank of Scotland branches over the last year alone, in the wake of the disastrous takeover of HBOS.
It emerged recently as the most-complained about financial services firm, according to figures from the Financial Ombudsman: Lloyds received nearly 45,000 complaints last year.
Horta-Osorio has pledged to cut complaints by a fifth as part of a drive to improve its poor customer service record.
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