By Scott Wright
GLASGOW-based Virgin Money, owner of the former Clydesdale Bank, has declared its customers “aren’t yet showing signs of distress” as the cost-of-living crisis deepens.
Chief executive David Duffy said yesterday that the bank’s asset quality “remains resilient” as it reported growth in lending and customer numbers in the third quarter of its financial year. Mortgages were said by the bank to be stable at £57.8 billion.
The lender, formed by the merger of Clydesdale and Yorkshire banks owner CYBG and Virgin Money first announced in 2018, said unsecured lending grew by 3.8 per cent in the quarter to £6bn. This was driven by “high-quality” credit card balances from “strong” new account growth, higher retail spending and new digital propositions.
Business loans edged up by 0.3% to £8.3bn in a “subdued” market and a 7.5% fall in Government-backed lending.
Virgin said credit quality continued to be “resilient”. Meanwhile, the bank said its net interest margin continued to be strong, boosted by higher interest rates.
Shares closed up 2.5%, or 3.6p, at 147.5p.
It started a major buyback with an initial re-purchase of £75m of shares in the quarter.
Mr Duffy said: “Looking out into an uncertain economic environment, while our asset quality remains resilient and customers aren’t yet showing signs of financial stress, we are helping our customers and colleagues navigate what will be a more difficult period for many.”
The bank’s view on the cost of living echoed comments from Alison Rose, chief executive of NatWest Group, who said on Friday that the owner of Royal Bank of Scotland was “not seeing any increase in distress, or debt, or calls coming in for help and support” as it unveiled a rise in first-half profits.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel