The Alliance and Leicester is advising its shareholders to approve the proposed takeover by Santander to avoid major risks to the business in the future.
A letter has been sent to all Alliance and Leicester shareholders from the chairman explaining that shareholder support would protect them from exposure to the economic slowdown that is hitting many financial institutions. He quoted external factors that are by definition out of the banks control.
The takeover of the Alliance and Leicester is set to go ahead in October, creating a much larger organisation that would be responsible for around ten percent of all the current accounts in the UK.
The Halifax is weighing in to the student bank account market with an offer that includes a GBP3,000 interest free overdraft, reduced cost card insurance and discounted AA membership.
An important aspect of this offer from the Halifax is that the overdraft is valid for up to five years, giving students a full year after graduation to find employment and be in a position to pay off the borrowing. Account holders will also find that, should they be in credit on their account the Halifax will even pay them interest of two percent.
Management of the Halifax student account can be done through branch, phone or online, making it easy for students to access and manage their finances at any time.
Barclays saw a drop in profits of a third for the first half of the year, with write downs impacting seriously on the bottom line. Barclays Insurance though, a division of the bank, performed very well.
The bank still made profits of GBP2.75 billion despite the write downs and, even though the bank itself was disappointed, industry analysts felt this was better than could have been expected. Other financial institutions have suffered much more dramatic cuts than Barclays, insurance and other sectors helping support the bank.
Looking forwards the Barclays management team are expecting trading conditions to remain testing and are advising the market that it could be some time before they are back to previous levels of profitability. Barclays Insurance, having performed very well, may actually see some parts of it sold to bolster the balance sheet.
