Close Brothers shares sink as infamous short-seller warns of motor finance ‘wipeout’ March 16, 2026 Shares in Close Brothers plummeted on Monday after a group notorious for short-selling warned the bank had “systematically misrepresented” its exposure to the motor finance scandal. The FTSE 250 bank nosedived as much as 12 per cent during afternoon trading after Viceroy Research, a group famed for its exposés of Wirecard and Home Reit, warned [...]
UK banking sector faces ‘AI-washing’ legal warning March 16, 2026 The UK’s banking sector is facing a new wave of regulatory AI warnings as bullish lenders race to rapidly beef up their tech capacity. Rosehana Amin, cyber and litigation partner at Clyde & Co LLP, warned banks may face a significant legal liability over misleading markets over their use of AI. Speaking at the City [...]
What happens now after Lloyds Bank’s tech disaster? March 13, 2026 Customers at Lloyds Banking Group were sent into panic on Thursday morning after a number of users opened their mobile app to find rogue transactions that did not belong to them. Screenshots quickly flooded social media with many of the bank’s 28m customers describing their horror at seeing up thousands of pounds of bizarre payments. [...]
Revolut’s triumph reminds us what British tech sector is capable of March 12, 2026 There hasn’t been much good news around lately – between the UK’s miserable growth trajectory, war in the Middle East and the whiff of decay in Downing Street, it’s been hard to find the optimism. But when something genuinely impressive happens in British business, it’s worth pausing to take notice. And this week we had [...]
Lloyds Bank investigating ‘technical glitch’ as users see rogue transactions March 12, 2026 Lloyds Banking Group is looking into a “technical glitch” that left users of the bank’s app on Thursday morning seeing other users’ transactions on their mobile app. The group – which consists of Lloyds, Halifax and Bank of Scotland – responded to concerned customers on X in the early morning that it was looking into [...]
Revolut is now a bank. Raise a glass to this stellar British success story March 11, 2026 It has been a painfully long wait for Revolut. But at last, the patience of Europe’s most valuable fintech has paid off. Its British banking licence has arrived. This is the final step in Revolut’s decade-long journey to become a fully-fledged bank. That means it is no longer – by any yardstick – a startup. [...]
Grounds for expansion: Airwallex’s Europe chief bets on London in licence pursuit March 6, 2026 As payments giant Airwallex laid out plans to double down on Europe, they turned to a man with experience at a multi-billion dollar deposit holder. The $8bn cross-border specialist was looking for someone to steer the ship amid expansion plans across Europe but in that endeavour didn’t poach a veteran of Wall Street or the [...]
Metro Bank shares dip after SME lending pivot sees profit balloon March 4, 2026 Metro Bank has swung back into profit as the firm’s pivot into small business lending led to a bump in revenue. The FTSE 250 lender returned to profitability with a pre-tax profit of just north of £98m – a 15-year high and major clawback from losses of £14m last year. The swing came as Metro [...]
City watchdog plots streamlined motor finance scheme after backlash March 4, 2026 The UK’s financial watchdog is looking to “streamline” its long-anticipated motor finance compensation scheme following widespread backlash across the industry. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) provided a fresh update to markets on Wednesday, stating it was considering over 1,000 responses to its proposals for the industry-wide redress scheme. It added “if” it was to proceed [...]
Blackstone’s private credit fund hands investors record redemptions March 3, 2026 The world’s largest alternative asset manager is allowing investors to pull a record amount of cash from its flagship private credit fund as anxiety continues to ripple through the trillion-dollar industry. Blackstone will permit investors to redeem 7.9 per cent of shares from the fund – the equivalent to a whopping $3.8bn. The financial giant [...]