Lloyds Banking Group and RBS expected to meet with the Chancellor over lending to SMEs.
The government is to take issue over anaemic lending to the UK SME community with Alistair Darling reportedly going to meet directly with the heads of the UKs major banks.
Some analysts have said the move is too late and the government should have already been stricter with Lloyds Banking Group and RBS whom the government partly owns.Nevertheless, the Chancellor Alistair Darling has set a meeting for this afternoon, and bosses from Lloyds Banking Group, RBS, HSBC and Barclays will attend.
The Chancellor will have his corner boosted by the stronger health of the banking sector; today sees the banks continue a fine run on a newly resurgent FTSE, suggesting the markets believe the banks to be out of the danger that lead them to restricting their loan sheets in the first place.
Lloyds Banking Group shares (LON:LLOY) are 2.58% up at 8:32am, and RBS (LON:RBS) shares are 3.92% up.
The Chancellor is believed to be “extremely concerned” about lending to businesses and said that banks must “live up to the promises” they made after being bailed out with £37 billion in taxpayers’ money.
Darling said yesterday the rate of interest charged by banks appeared to have risen while the base rate is at an historic low of 0.5%.
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