LONDON, April 25, 2026, 20:40 BST
- NatWest’s latest filing showed more share purchases for cancellation under its buyback programme.
- The bank reports first-quarter results on May 1, with investors focused on margins, bad-debt charges and capital returns.
- Barclays, Lloyds and Standard Chartered report earlier in the week, setting up a quick read on UK bank profit momentum.
NatWest Group Plc will cancel shares bought under its repurchase programme after another week of purchases, keeping capital returns in view just days before the British lender reports first-quarter results. A Friday regulatory notice showed purchases from UBS AG, London Branch, over April 20-24 at prices ranging from 575.6 pence to 613 pence; after settlement, NatWest said it would have 7.974 billion ordinary shares in issue excluding treasury stock.
The timing matters. NatWest will publish Q1 2026 results at 7 a.m. BST on May 1, followed by a management presentation at 9 a.m., giving investors the first clean test this year of whether the bank can keep growth, margins and buybacks moving together.
Consensus forecasts compiled by NatWest Investor Relations, based on analyst models as at April 20, put first-quarter net interest income — lending income after funding costs — at £3.41 billion, total income at £4.31 billion and operating profit before tax at £1.94 billion. The same consensus puts Q1 net interest margin, the spread between loan income and funding costs, at 2.47%.
NatWest entered the year with a strong earnings base. The bank reported 2025 operating pretax profit of £7.7 billion, return on tangible equity, a key profitability measure, of 19.2%, and a CET1 ratio — the core capital buffer regulators watch most closely — of 14.0%. It said total 2025 distributions announced were £4.1 billion, including £1.5 billion of buybacks and £2.6 billion of dividends.
The latest buyback follows a £750 million programme announced alongside NatWest’s planned purchase of Evelyn Partners. NatWest said in February the £2.7 billion deal would create the UK’s leading private banking and wealth management business, lift fee income by about 20% before revenue synergies and cut its CET1 ratio by about 130 basis points; it also said its next buyback announcement was expected at its H1 2027 results.
The peer read-through will come quickly. Barclays reports first-quarter results on Tuesday, Lloyds Banking Group on Wednesday and Standard Chartered on Thursday, before NatWest closes out the UK bank run on Friday, according to the latest earnings calendar.
Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell, wrote on Friday that the FTSE 350 Banks sector was “starting to lose a little momentum” after a long rally and said the five big UK lenders could make a “steady rather than spectacular start” to 2026. The risk is that impairment provisions — charges for loans that may not be repaid — rise as geopolitical uncertainty and delayed rate cuts pressure borrowers; AJ Bell said analysts expect £2.6 billion of Q1 provisions across Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds, NatWest and Standard Chartered, up from about £2 billion a year earlier. AJ Bell
NatWest’s own targets leave little room for a soft update. In February, the bank guided for 2026 income of £17.2 billion to £17.6 billion, other operating costs of about £8.2 billion and return on tangible equity above 17%. It also set a 2028 target for return on tangible equity above 18%.
NatWest shares last traded in London at 579.4 pence on Friday, down 0.9%, according to market data shown by ADVFN. That leaves next week’s update doing more than checking a quarterly box: it will show whether the buyback story still has the earnings cover investors expect.
