New Trade Association U.K. Finance Has Been Formed

The U.K. Finance, a new trade association, announced Monday (July 3) it was formed on July 1 to represent the finance and banking industry in the U.K.

In a press release announcing the new association, the trade group said it will represent 300 firms in the U.K. and will provide credit, banking, markets and payment services. The new group will carry out the activities previously handled by the  Asset Based Finance Assn., the British Bankers’ Assn., the Council of Mortgage Lenders, Financial Fraud Action UK, Payments UK and the UK Cards Assn.

According to a report in Reuters James Bardrick, chief executive for Citigroup in Britain, is kicking off the group’s activities, leading a talk covering wholesale banking for the new  U.K. finance industry lobby group that launched Monday. The CEO of the new trade group is former Santander U.K. and Barclays executive Stephen Jones, and its chairman is Bob Wigley, who was previously EMEA chairman of Merrill Lynch, noted Reuters. The new association was created following calls by banks and other financial firms for the creation of one trade group. The idea is that if the disparate groups were merged into one it would lower costs and result in a more coordinated approach to dealing with issues such as ethics, fraud, crime, access to the markets, technology and diversity, noted the report. It will also probably include a focus on how the banking industry in the U.K. prepares and deals with the U.K.’s exit from the European Union, noted Reuters.

The pound has been on a downward spiral since the Brexit referendum, and inflation is reflected in lack of consumer spending. In May, the U.K. saw its first decline in consumer spending since September 2013, as it dropped at an annual rate of 0.8 percent. Inflation has accelerated over the last year and is currently outstripping annual wage increases. It is expected that inflation will reach about 3 percent by the end of the year. The failure of earnings to keep pace is putting pressure on households, and by extension is suffocating service companies, which make up the largest part of the economy. Retail demand is similarly plunging.

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