By Anthony O. Goriainoff

Metro Bank said it swung to a pretax loss for the year after booking higher costs, and backed its guidance for 2025.

The U.K. lender said Thursday that pretax loss was 212.1 million pounds ($268.9 million) in 2024 compared with a profit of 30.5 million pounds the year before. The company said this was mostly driven by a one-off 101.6 million pounds loss on the sale of a 2.5 billion pounds mortgage portfolio to NatWest Group.

The bank posted total income of 405.3 million pounds, down from 648.9 million pounds as net fee and other income fell year-on-year to 125.6 million pounds from 134.6 million pounds on increased competition within foreign exchange markets.

Net interest margin--the difference between interest paid on deposits and that earned on loans--fell to 1.91% from 1.98%, it added.

Customer deposits fell 7% as at Dec. 31, 2024, to 14.5 billion pounds, "reflecting the deliberate focus to reduce excess liquidity and cost of deposits," the bank said.

The bank ended the period with a common equity Tier 1 ratio--a key measure of balance-sheet strength--of 12.5%, down from 13.1% on Dec. 31, 2023.

In July, the bank guided for mid-to-upper single-digit return on tangible equity--or ROTE, a key profitability measure--in 2025.

"Metro Bank has a strong and compelling plan, differentiated model and clear path forward to further growth," it said.

Shares in early trade were down 6.50 pence, or 6.7%, at 91.30 pence.

Write to Anthony O. Goriainoff at anthony.orunagoriainoff@dowjones.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

February 27, 2025 03:26 ET (08:26 GMT)

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