LONDON, March 12, 2026, 13:49 GMT
- Lloyds slipped 2.7% to 95.77 pence as of 1348 GMT, with shares hit after the bank reported an app glitch.
- Lloyds resolved the problem that for a short period let customers view each other’s transactions, and said it’s looking into what led to the glitch.
- Rising oil prices have stoked inflation worries, complicating the Bank of England’s next steps and piling pressure on the UK’s top mortgage lender.
Lloyds Banking Group slipped in London trading Thursday, after news of an app glitch that briefly exposed customer transaction details to other users added to the pressure. Shares traded at 95.77 pence by 1348 GMT, off 2.7% and hovering just above the day’s low of 95.66 pence. The stock had previously closed at 98.38 pence.
This comes at an odd moment. Just weeks back, Lloyds raised its 2026 profit goal and pointed to a deeper bet on AI and digital upgrades. Sentiment can swing quickly for Britain’s top mortgage lender as UK rate and housing prospects move.
Lloyds reported the problem was fixed and said it’s investigating the cause. The disruption adds to concerns around operational risk at UK banks, after lawmakers last year tallied at least 803 hours of unscheduled outages among nine major lenders and building societies spanning January 2023 through February 2025.
Choppy conditions Thursday: Britain’s main stock indexes lost ground as oil pushed past $100 a barrel, while traders pared back expectations for Bank of England easing. A Reuters poll out that day found most economists now see the BoE leaving rates at 3.75% on March 19, pushing the first cut out to April or June.
For Lloyds, higher-for-longer rates are a double-edged sword: they can fatten lending income but also tighten pressure on borrowers and slow mortgage appetite. “The longer the disruption goes on, the greater the impact on energy prices and in turn global inflation,” said AJ Bell’s Danni Hewson. Over at UBS, economist Dean Turner flagged the oil shock as a reason the next BoE cut is now more likely pushed back until April. Reuters
The digital rivalry is heating up. On Wednesday, Revolut announced it had secured regulatory approval to roll out a UK bank, putting it in a position to go head-to-head with established names like Lloyds, Barclays, and NatWest in consumer lending and current accounts. “This will sharpen pressure,” said Elliot Reader, director in Houlihan Lokey’s fintech group, adding that both the old guard and newer challengers now face a tougher landscape. Reuters
Lloyds bumped up its 2026 return on tangible equity goal to above 16% last month and rolled out a £1.75 billion share buyback after posting a 12% jump in annual profit. The buyback lets the bank scoop up its own shares. Return on tangible equity, which leaves out goodwill and other intangibles, tracks profit against shareholder capital. At the time, Chief Executive Charlie Nunn credited “business momentum and strategic delivery” for the upgraded outlook. Reuters
Buybacks remain in play. Lloyds disclosed in a March 10 filing that it bought back 6.23 million shares for cancellation, paying an average of 98.6964 pence each as part of its current programme. Still, the shares ended Thursday roughly 16% under their 52-week peak of 114.60 pence.
The outage is just one piece of the puzzle. On Thursday, Reuters flagged fresh worries in Britain’s housing market—buyers are getting cold feet, eyeing pricier mortgages and fallout from the Middle East conflict. That spells trouble for Lloyds: a tech misstep, fading housing appetite, and a rate environment that might bolster pricing power, but could still drag on loan volumes and ding credit quality.
