RBS reports £968m net loss

RBS losses have doubled on the same period in 2015

Royal Bank of Scotland headquarters (Rex)

The Royal Bank of Scotland, Britain’s largest taxpayer-owned lender, posted a deeper loss in the first quarter as it paid for some of the government support it received during the financial crisis.

The net loss widened to £968m from £459m a year ago, the Edinburgh-based lender said in a statement on Friday. That’s bigger than the £957m loss average estimate by 10 analysts in a company compiled survey.

RBS cast further doubt over its plans to resume dividends after warning on Thursday of a “significant risk” that it would miss a European Union deadline to separate its Williams & Glyn unit by the end of 2017. Disposing of the consumer division is among a series of roadblocks to the first payout after RBS required a £45.5bn UK government bailout in the financial crisis. It is also awaiting a settlement with USS authorities over the sale of mortgage-backed securities.

“We continue to deal with a range of uncertainties in the external environment, not least those caused by the forthcoming referendum on the UK’s continuing membership of the European Union,” the bank said in the statement.

The stock has fallen about 19 per cent this year in London and is the second-worst performing major British lender behind Barclays. RBS trades below the 407 pence a share, at which the government says it would break even on its 2008 and 2009 rescue.

RBS paid £1.2bn to the EU Treasury in March to scrap the so-called dividend access share, which was installed as part of its bailout conditions to give the state rights to a preferential dividend. The move was viewed at the time as a step toward the resumption of dividends as early as 2017.

The bank, which is 73 percent government-owned, posted its eighth consecutive annual loss in February, battered by costs for past misconduct.

© 2016 Bloomberg L.P