LONDON, Nov 1: Britain’s state-rescued Lloyds bank set aside another £1.0 billion on Thursday to compensate clients who were mis-sold insurance, pushing it into another third-quarter loss.

Lloyds Banking Group, which is 39.6-per cent owned by the taxpayer after a vast bailout at the height of the global financial crisis, said that the new provision would take its total bill for the insurance mis-selling scandal to £5.3 billion. The London-listed bank added in a results statement that it faced a net loss of £361 million in the three months to the end of September.

However, that marked an improvement from a shortfall of £501 million a year earlier. Chief executive Antonio Horta-Osorio added the PPI charges were the “primary driver behind the statutory loss”.

However, stripping out the PPI provision, the group doubled its underlying profit to a better-than-expected £840 million in the third quarter, as it cut bad debts and narrowed losses from its non-core businesses.—AFP