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Given that this stock trended between 50 and 60 all of 2019 during favourable conditions and good dividends it is hard to see how this long term underperforming stock has much upside at all. So while 50 may be achievable the next couple of years it is now difficult to look at Lloyds as a growth stock or even a safe dividend stock. They cannot increase marketshare in Retail, they destroyed the Commercial Division and never managed to build out SME and Mid Markets and never did anything with the Private Bank. The share is much lower than when AHO took over in 2013 and the UK centric Brexit hostile strategy they adopted (against all logic) makes long term growth impossible. Sure, a new CEO and Chairman comes in but this stock is nothing better than a short term punt on UK recovery. Which obviously may be good enough for now.

HAHA, 100pct fake news but clever (but pointless) positioning from AOC. Sen Cruz is one of the most intellectual and knowledgeable members of the Senate. AOC however, is ignorant, but great at self-marketing. The bigger Joke of course is that the "establishment"thinks the Paris agreement is somehow any good for the climate when it allows China and India to pollute while imposing costs on the Western world as US is one of the biggest reducers of greenhouse gases the last few years. Even the idiots at the UN admits so in their most recent 2021 report. Reality is of course that the US will as always innovate the world out of the climate problem and not UN, EU, the Paris agreement or other hapless government initiatives.

Hello, I have not been following this blog during C19 so sorry if I have missed this information:

Are there any news from Lloyds about resuming dividends in 2021?? Thanks!

Many thanks!

Tell me about it - as an ex employee with quite a bit of deferred compensation in shares that I can't sell its awful. The dividend was the only positive. Thanks for replying! I think better buying large US Banks as they usually recover faster and will make money from volatility in commodities, bonds, shares and FX all of which Lloyds has very very little.

Am I right in saying this means no dividend payment for year 2020 and no final dividend payment from 2019?

My only reason to be on this blog is my interest in Lloyds Bank, I have no view wether UK should be in or out of EU. If you guys know something about how Brexit that will benefit Lloyds I would be really interested to hear it as I think the market has missed it for the last three years!

Sorry not to be clear. What I meant was that within the dire constraints of a UK only strategy for a bank that has maxed out its market share in Retail, AHO explained in Davos yesterday that an area of growth for LBG in the UK is pensions/wealth. While this obviously true and they have indeed the partnership with Schroders (with the aim to be "a top UK financial planning business within five years), I tried to express my doubts about their ability to succeed in such a material way that it will have a profound impact on the bottom line(within a reasonable period of time). While Schroders is a credible pick, the distribution platforms such as Halifax Share Dealing Service and Lloyds Private Bank are very weak and poorly set up to service individuals with significant savings. Their market share in anything else than Retail and perhaps "mass affluent" segments is notoriously low. So while they may be able to bring some relevant products and value to the existing millions of retail clients, they are unlikely to make any market share gains in the battle for the "high net worth" and "ultra high net worth" segments where the competition is fierce from a vast array of international and established players.

Yes, it has been an impressive turn-around by UK Bank standards! Successful implementation of post-crises consolidation strategy of selling HBOS wild global assets, focusing on increased returns and digitising the consumer bank. But the financial crises was more than a decade ago and the strategy of focusing exclusively on the UK has run out of relevance as it can not provide sustainable growth. Despite knowing that Brexit would be bad for the Bank, the chairman advocated it and instead of building a strategy that hedged the Brexit risk for the share holders they still sing the same old song. They have kept the shareholders hostage to Brexit the last three years and aligned the value of the company to what is going on in the Parliament. A terrible thing to do especially if you want to come across as a stable high returning stock and avoid speculation in the stock. Besides, on Bloomberg TV this morning AHO (Davos) could not explain how shareholders would see growth out of this single country. Pensions and financial advice he suggested but we all know they are not set up for that neither on the product or distribution side(they don t have the right clients nor private bankers). Their long suffering corporate bank cannot compete against RBC, Barclays and HSBC with the present set-up of managers who only focus on cutting costs. Yes, perhaps the stock will go up if there is a decent deal with EU but what happens if there is not and if there are more "accidents" forcing them to cut the dividend? Hard to see any upside on this stock given all this.

Think this is just business as usual i.e. part of long term program of cost cutting and consolidation.