Ray Perman
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Should we break-up RBS?
Unlike Lloyds, where the Government has been steadily selling shares it acquired when the bank had to be rescued in 2008, RBS remains 80% owned by the public. Despite a drastic pruning of its balance sheet and the sale of non-core businesses, its stock price is still substantially below the level at which taxpayers, who
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Bank of England non-execs – you can’t even use them to wash your socks
According to the television executive Michael Grade non-executive directors are like bidets – no-one is sure what exactly they are for, but they add a touch of class.
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Why the Scottish Government should help fund the Green Investment Bank
My last blog highlighted an opportunity for the Scottish Government to take action no matter what the outcome of the referendum on September 18 and this one is the same. No matter whether we are heading for independence or sticking with the Union, there is a strong case for co-funding the Green Investment Bank.
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A golden opportunity to reform the Scottish banking market
Whatever the referendum result on September 18, the Scottish banking system needs reforming and the Scottish Government has a golden opportunity to try to do something about it.
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Class actions likely to end in pyrrhic victories for Lloyds & RBS shareholders
Shareholders in Lloyds and RBS will get their day in court. That will at least enable them to vent their frustrations and further expose the stupidity of the boards and executives who presided over the catastrophic drops in the value of their investments, but both actions are likely to result in pyrrhic victories.
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The John Lewis of banking? TSB says Yes
Can the TSB claim to be the John Lewis of Banking? Following my blog post last week questioning that claim, here is the detailed response from Anthony Hus, Media Relations (Corporate) Manager at the TSB. I read with interest your recent blog titled “The ‘John Lewis’ of banking? Not with this level of bonus”
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The “John Lewis” of banking? Not with this level of bonus
It’s a measure of how inured we have become to the excesses of bankers, and how numbed by high numbers, that when TSB announced its pay policy recently a limit on the maximum pay of its chief executive to £1.65 million — 65 times the average salary of its ordinary staff — could be presented
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Lloyds profits are good news for taxpayers and chancellor too
There now looks to be a more than even chance that we taxpayers will get back the money we pumped into Lloyds to prevent it going bust after the disastrous takeover of HBOS in 2008-9.