British banks' misconduct bill has reached nearly $75 bln -study

LONDON, April 11 (Reuters) - Lawsuits and misconduct fineshave cost Britain's largest retail banks and customer-ownedlenders almost 53 billion pounds ($74.86 billion) over the past15 years, a new study has found.

The scale of the payouts has hampered banks' efforts torebuild capital, restricted the amount they are able to lend andreduced dividends for investors.

Britain's banks have been hit by scandals ranging from themanipulation of foreign exchange and benchmark interest rates tothe mis-selling of loan insurance and complex interest-ratehedging products.

While lenders have struggled to return money to shareholdersbecause of the charges, they have continued to pay billions ofpounds in bonuses to staff, the study by the independentthink-tank New City Agenda said.

"The profitability of UK retail banks has been imperilled bypersistent misconduct," said John McFall, a director of New CityAgenda and former Treasury Committee chairman.

"This has made every citizen poorer through our pensionfunds and our ownership of the bailed out banks."

The report said the mis-selling of payment protectioninsurance alone cost banks at least 37.3 billion pounds inBritain's costliest consumer scandal.

Lloyds Banking Group (LLOY.L) had to set aside 14 billionpounds to cover misconduct between 2010 and 2014, almost twicethe amount of any other British lender, the report said. ($1 = 0.7080 pounds) (Reporting By Andrew MacAskill; Editing by David Goodman)