Challenger bank Aldermore's profits more than double in first half
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Version 0 of 1. The bank Aldermore’s profit more than doubled in the first half of the year, beating expectations, as the up-and-coming British lender issued more mortgages and loans to small- and medium-sized businesses. Aldermore, the latest in a wave of banks to list in London with the aim of challenging Britain’s “Big Five” lenders, reported underlying pretax profit of £44m for the six months of 2015. Customer deposits were up by 11%, to £5bn, in the period, while SME deposits were 20% higher at £1.2bn The so-called challenger bank joins rivals Virgin Money, OneSavings Bank and Shawbrook in reporting a bigger first-half profit, fuelled by greater lending to small- and medium-sized enterprises. Aldermore said on Thursday it was on track for net loan growth of about £1.4bn, or 30%, for the full year. Its shares were up nearly 9% at 302p by Thursday lunchtime, having floated at 192p. |