SIR VICTOR Blank will step down as chairman of Lloyds Banking Group by the time of its annual meeting in 2010, in an effort to appease shareholder anger over the UK bank’s takeover of HBOS.
Lord Leitch, Lloyds’s senior director, will become its deputy chairman with immediate effect.
The move comes just days after government officials insisted that Sir Victor continued to enjoy the full support of the British government, which owns 43 per cent of the bank.
Lloyds – which operates in Ireland under the Halifax and Bank of Scotland (Ireland) brands – revealed last week that it expected the provisions for problem corporate loans would rise by more than 50 per cent in 2009.
Sir Victor said he would continue working at the bank to ensure the successful integration of Lloyds and HBOS. Pressure has been mounting on him to resign after the takeover of HBOS last year. Most of Lloyds’s bad debt charges, which analysts believe could reach more than £14 billion (€15.7 billion), arise from property loans made by HBOS. – (Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009)
