OneSavings share price soars as challenger bank doubles profits after IPO
Challenger bank OneSavings more than doubled its profits last year, yesterday reporting strong buy-to-let and small business lending.
Statutory pre-tax profits came in at £63.7m for 2014, up from £31.4m in 2013. That includes the £7.4m OneSavings spent on its stock market flotation last summer.
The bank is made up of several different units and brands, targetting niches across different markets.
Its Kent Reliance brand focuses on mortgages, largely in London and the south east. It also has small business specialist InterBay, secured loan firm Prestige Finance and its new development finance arm Heritable.
Chief executive Andy Golding said he plans growth of 20 per cent per year for the forseeable future, but will not let the firm become unmanageably large.
“I’m a bit of a control freak, I like the senior team to be able to keep their arms around the business,” he told Morning Wire. “For example, for every loan above £1m, me, the finance director, the chief risk officer and chief credit officer meet to personally sanction it.”
OneSavings’ shares rose by 14.78 per cent yesterday.