Lloyds shares fall further

More bad news for the UK taxpayer emerged this morning as Lloyds Banking Group shares took a tumble of 20% on the back of it’s takeover of HBOS and the latest profit warning put out on Friday by the latter sending shockwaves through the market amid fears it may require further state capital or even worse need to be fully nationalised.

Unbelievably Lloyds appeared  surprised when it announced on Friday that HBOS would make a pretax loss  of  £10bn, in excess of  expectations due to a jump in losses on corporate loans at the tail end of last year. The news had the immediate effect of wiping a third off the value of shares in the bank on Friday and has continued to see further losses on the stockmarket this morning.

City watchdog put ban on bank short-selling

A City watchdog earlier this week took drastic measures of banning the short-selling of financial stocks a move unprecedented in modern times.

The temporary ban was agreed ay a meeting at 11 Downing Street between Alistair Darling, chancellor, Mervyn King, Bank of England governor, Sir Callum McCarthy, outgoing Financial Services Authority chairman, and his successor, Lord Turner. Read more