Co-operative News

Where The Co-operative Bank leads, the Nationwide Building Society follows.  That at least seems to be the sad position regarding capital holes.  Both have announced clear routes out of their problems.   The Co-operative Bank will be partially demutualised in order to save it.  At present the Bank is a PLC wholly owned by the […]

The Co-operative Bank has been downgraded by Moody’s credit ratings agency from A3 to Ba3 – in other words from being of good quality to being what is called ‘junk’.  This sounds more serious than it is: there is no serious prospect of the bank being unable to meet its liabilities and it is shored

It’s not just a change of leadership at the Co-operative Group and Bank.  While it is not quite a clear out, it is less a reform and more a revolution.  Not only do we have a new cadre of leaders, but they are people who have been successful elsewhere.  The emphasis is on quality, rather

It is rather strange that an arm of government called the Behavioural Insights Team, staffed by worthy academics, should attract major national headlines, but in recent days it has.  If you missed this, it is probably because the team is widely called the ‘Nudge Unit’ – its research considers how the Government can persuade, or

The Co-operative Bank has been downgraded by Moody’s credit ratings agency from A3 to Ba3 – in other words from being of good quality to being what is called ‘junk’. This sounds more serious than it is: there is no serious prospect of the bank being unable to meet its liabilities and it is shored

It seems to me to be gross bad taste to celebrate anyone’s death, but this does seem an appropriate moment to reflect on the impact on the co-operative and wider mutual sector of Margaret Thatcher. This becomes even more apposite because the death so nearly coincided with the publication of the Parliamentary investigation into the

Last year created a difficult trading environment for The Co-operative Group.  While the Group reported an operating profit of £54m –compared to £526m in 2011 and weak on a turnover of £13.5bn – this converted into a net loss of £599m. The main cause of the net loss related to difficulties in the non-core activities

The Co-operative Banking Group has submitted a bid for the 632 Lloyds TSB branches that the state-rescued bank is being forced to sell under European Union competition rules.But Co-op Banking Group chairman Paul Flowers told the News that the proposal is low risk and is not ‘betting the bank’. “The overarching strategy is still to

Manchester’s hosting of the International Co-operative and Mutual Insurance Federation’s biennial conference was a great success. But amidst the presentations from chief executives of some world’s largest life and non-life insurers, arguably the stand-out contribution came from Nigel Waite, a consultant with the Canford Centre for Customer Development. He has been a marketing director with

The launch of the International Year of Co-operatives is an opportunity to take stock. New York was the obvious place for the launch, given that the Year has been declared by the United Nations – and its headquarters are in the ‘big apple’. However, it would be understandable if many co-operators felt there could be

Although building societies are owned by their members, some also have ‘shareholders’. However, building society shareholders have a very limited role – they are investors, with no additional votes beyond their status as society members. Holders of building societies’ ‘permanent interest bearing shares’ (PIBS) are the equivalent of bondholders in a bank, or other company.

The Energy Saving Co-operative has very big ideas. Its co-founder and would-be chief executive Ewan Jones says: “There is a £10bn annual market for retro-fitting homes and the co-op is aiming for at least 10% of this market. The demise of the Energy Saving Trust leaves a gap for the co-op. “ The concept for