And... a few hours later another Motley Fool writes...

" It’s also worth highlighting that the average target price for Lloyds is 60p, that’s around 45% higher than the current share price. Such a large discrepancy is unusual. "

A first for me - the govt wants to increase the SP of my NatWest shares. 🚀


Lloyds, Barclays, NatWest called for share price summit with government
Last updated: 15:55 18 Jan 2024 GMT First Published: 15:25 18 Jan 2024 GMT
Written by: Philip Whiterow


Bosses of the UK’s listed banks are to attend a summit to find ways to boost their stock market value, according to a report today.

Franck Petitgas, Rishi Sunak's chief business adviser, has called the meeting amid rising government concerns that the languishing share prices of Britain’s major banks are a bar to their willingness and ability to lend.

Chiefs of Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds Banking, NatWest group and Santander UK will meet with Chancellor Jeremy Hunt next Tuesday to discuss the issue, Sky News reported.

Share in UK banks have struggled since the banking crisis of 2009 with the government still sitting on a hefty stake in Natwest that it acquired when it bailed out the bank.

The government has said it wants to clear that stake entirely, including potentially through a sale to the public, but over the past twelve months the price of Natwest shares has dropped by 30%.

Lloyds and Barclays have fared only marginally better with falls of 14% and 23% respectively.

HSBC has been largely flat but has been buoyed by extensive Asian business even with the ongoing Chinese property crisis while Santander is listed in Spain.

A spokesperson for the Treasury told Sky: "The UK's banking and financial services sector is world-leading - we're the largest net exporter of financial services and continue to lead the way in areas such as legal services, finance, insurance, and private equity with the largest markets in Europe.

"We continue to engage with the sector to find new and better ways to unlock growth across the whole of the UK.”

As I have posted several times before, UK banks are uninvestable. Banks are heavily regulated utilities and ex growth, they are really a cartel. HSBC should demerge Midland and relocate to Asia. More generally, UK markets are circling the drain thanks to government policy, ie making institutions sell equities and buy gilts, failing to update listing rules, increasing corporation tax, having some of the highest marginal personal tax rates in the world. The UK economy is best described as a large pension fund in runoff.

Agree with Keith. And like other large companies, they are wasting far too much time, energy and money on ESG and DEI baloney (i.e. dodgy politics) instead of being focused on business success and profitability. The dead hand of government has been too involved in their fortunes, literally at the board level for years after the GFC, and now the government wants to find out how to solve lacklustre performance... It's a doom loop of delusion and stupidity.

Don't ask me how I ended up here, but I found this page on the Lloyds Babk website recently. I had been thinking about buying their shares directly, amongst some other companies I was looking into, but by the time I'd finished reading this page and trying to get my head around what they were prattling on about, I'd completely gone off bothering with them

https://www.lloydsbankinggroup.c...city-in-advertising.html

The recent goings on at Natwest have the same horrible vibe, and I think the others are probably as bad. I know that the US banks are similarly tainted but am not sure if they've retained a little more sense about them?

This is the only reason the government is arsed about bank share prices (obviously). The more they get from flogging their (our!) NWG holding, the easier it will be to obey Rees Mogg’s demands to abolish the Caviar Tax and Foie Gras Surcharge ahead of their election embarrassment. Trusting this mob to get good value for taxpayers isn’t an easy sell - it already has a Link/Woodford sniff to it. But at least Liz and Kwasi aren’t running it I suppose (shudder!).


The UK government has asked City of London firms to submit proposals to work on a potential retail offering of NatWest Group PLC (LSE:NWG) shares, in what would be the most high-profile privatisation in London this year.

The Times said the multibillion-pound public sale of shares in NatWest could happen as soon as June, in a move that would evoke Margaret Thatcher’s 'Tell Sid' privatisation spirit ahead of a general election.

Bloomberg reported advisers must present their bids by late February, with the Treasury hoping to run an announcement about the share sale alongside its budget on 6 March, citing several people familiar with the matter.

Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt unveiled plans in November for a potential retail sale within 12 months, with any divestment “subject to market conditions and achieving value for money”.

The government, which is NatWest’s biggest shareholder, held a stake of almost 36% as of 19 January, according to a recent filing.

Economic secretary to the Treasury Bim Afolami told Bloomberg last week that prospects for a retail offer of the bank’s shares were “looking good”.