Co-op & Britannia to Merge

The Co-operative Financial Services (CFS), the company that consists of The Co-operative Bank, Co-operative Insurance Society & Smile, has today announced that it will merge with the Britannia Building Society creating what has been dubbed as a ‘Super Mutual’. The combined bank will have £70bn in assets and a Tier 1 capital ratio of 9.8%. [...]

Gov’t Announcement Due on Equitable Life Compensation

HM Treasury is expected to make a long awaited announcement on whether savers in Equitable Life, the collapsed life insurer and pension firm, will be compensated for their losses. Those who have suffered most are the societies pension customers who have seen the value of their investments or the payments from annuities slashed since the [...]

Welsh Credit Unions See Demand Surge

Credit Unions in Wales are reporting a surge in membership and requests for loans in the wake of the credit crunch. Wales recently became the first part of the UK to have universal access to a credit union for everyone living there.  The credit unions attribute the surge of interest in their services on the [...]

European Central Bank under pressure

The European Central Bank (ECB) is today under mounting pressure to reduce interest rates in the euro-zone. Rates in the United States and United Kingdom have fallen sharply in recent months but the ECB has been slow to follow. The growing disparity in rates has caused the Euro to gain in value against other world [...]

Bank of England cuts rates to 1.5%

In a further sign of economic weakness the Bank of England (BoE) has cut interest rates to 1.5% the lowest rate on record. The rate cut is seen as being relatively cautious as the bank was wary of cutting rates more aggressively because of a cut’s impact on the value of Sterling. It is however [...]

Happy New Year & Apologies

Happy New Year to our readership!
Apologies for the lack of content recently. The festive period and a personal illness has made posting impossible.
With the recent flurry of economic news, and slowly returning health, I hope to be posting more regularly again.

Credit Union/Social Fund Row

A row has erupted over a government consultation on Credit Union provision of social fund loans. The row is unfortunate as the credit unions are being portrayed by the tories as the bad guys when in fact they offer a generally excellent service. Many community credit unions are in deprived areas and offer a real [...]