Lloyds back in profit, but Irish loan losses mount

Lloyds is the latest bank to announce that it took a big hit from bad loans in Ireland.

The British lender said losses from loans not being repaid in Ireland rocketed to five billion euros from 3.4 billion euros in 2009.

Lloyds, which is Britain’s second biggest bank and Europe’s fifth largest, returned to profit with pretax earnings last year of the equivalent of 2.5 billion euros.

The part-nationalised lender’s results were better than those of loss-making Royal Bank of Scotland but paled in comparison to seven billion euros of profits at Barclays.

Lloyds also said its profit margins will not improve this year and its shares fell.

Lloyds is 41 percent owned by the UK government after being bailed out during the credit crisis when it was saddled with billions in losses from its takeover of troubled rival HBOS in 2008, a deal brokered by the previous Labour government.

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