NATWEST has moved to reduce the UK Government’s stake in the bank after buying back a significant tranche of shares from the Treasury in what it described as a “another important milestone”, it was announced this morning.
The FTSE 100 lender confirmed that it has spent £1 billion on the purchase of 263 million shares at 380.8p per share, reducing the government’s stake in the bank from 14.2% to 11.4%. It said that the shares will be cancelled.
NatWest has now bought back £2.2bn of shares in 2024, representing 7.66% of share capital, as the government ramps up its exit from the bank as part of plans to reduce taxpayers’ stake which was 84% after it stepped in to rescue Royal Bank of Scotland at the height of the global financial crisis in 2008.
'NatWest does have some real momentum behind it'
The government’s shareholding has reduced by more than two-thirds in 2024 from about 38% in December 2023.
In July, its stake in NatWest dropped below 20% for the first time since its 2008 nationalisation. The Treasury has gradually reduced its equity holding in the lender, which also owns private bank and wealth manager Coutts, Ulster Bank and Lombard.
Paul Thwaite, chief executive of NatWest, said: “As a result of NatWest Group’s continued strong performance, we are pleased to have today completed our second buyback of government shares of 2024, further reducing HM Treasury’s shareholding.
“This transaction represents another important milestone on the path to full privatisation. We believe it is a positive use of capital for the bank and for our shareholders, and we are pleased with the sustained momentum in reducing HM Treasury’s stake in NatWest Group throughout this year.”
NatWest secures £2.5bn deal for Sainsbury’s banking arm
NatWest has been able to accelerate the share sale plan following changes to listing earlier this year, which removed the 5% cap on the amount of stock that could be bought back in a year.
The new Labour UK Government also abandoned plans under the previous Conservative government for a share sale to the public after winning the General Election in July, which the previous government had put forward to create a “new generation of retail investors”.
Former chancellor Jeremy Hunt had hoped that a new generation of retail investors could buying some of the government’s remaining shareholding in NatWest.
Channelling Margaret Thatcher’s privatisations of big businesses like British Telecom and British Airways in the 1980s – which led to million Britons becoming shareholders for the first time – Mr Hunt pointed to the high-profile “If you see Sid, tell him” campaign, that saw about 1.5 million Britons buy British Gas shares.
However, in July, new Chancellor Rachel Reeves scrapped those plans. She said the government still intended to fully exit its shareholding in NatWest by 2025-26, but that a retail share offer would mean having to offer the public discounts worth hundreds of millions of pounds and would not represent value for money for the taxpayer.
Bank sale comes as no surprise as supermarkets go back to basics
NatWest had spent £24 million on the aborted campaign, with TV ads featuring Sir Trevor McDonald.
At Shore Capital, analyst Gary Greenwood commented: “This directed share buyback has come a little sooner than we expected and so brings forward the likely point at which the government will have fully exited its shareholding – we assume it will be all out by the middle of next year, or possibly sooner.
“The financial impact is to reduce both the share count and Common Equity Tier 1 (CET1) ratio, which we now expect to end the current financial year around the bottom end of the group’s 13-14% guidance range.”
NatWest boss: 'I’d like a Budget that unlocks growth'
Last month, the owner of Royal Bank of Scotland reported an operating profit before tax of £1.67bn for the third quarter, up from £1.3bn last year, as growing confidence in the economy underpinned growth in lending for mortgages and to business, with deposits and investments rising. It also raised its profit guidance for the full year.
Mr Thwaite declared at the time that the UK economy has “undoubtedly performed better than many expected” at the start of year, with inflation now below target, interest rates beginning to decrease, and unemployment low, sparking customer activity.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here