HBOS

HBOS

HBOS or the Halifax Bank of Scotland was founded in 2001 and provides business, corporate and retail banking and insurance and investment services. The group has three main subsidiaries:

• Bank of Scotland plc – the banking division of HBOS group that operates the bank of Scotland, Birmingham Midshires, Halifax, Halifax Financial Services (Holdings) Ltd, Intelligent Finance, Sainsbury’s Bank and The Mortgage Business.
• HBOS Australia – This consists of Bank of Western Australia Limited, Capital Finance Australia Limited and St Andrews Australia PTY Limited and was formed in 2004 to consolidate the group’s holdings in Australia.
• HBOS Insurance & Investment Group Limited – the groups insurance and investments division in the UK and Europe. It operates esure, First Alternative, St James Place Capital, Halifax General Insurance Services Ltd, Halifax Insurance Ireland, Clerical Medical, AA, Sainsbury’s and Sheila’s Wheels.

HBOS is the UK's largest mortgage and savings provider and the number one provider of new investment products. The Group is one of the UK's leading general insurers and currently around 65,000 are employed across the group in the UK alone.

HBOS has the biggest private shareholder base in the UK with 2.1m private shareholders. 80% of these shareholders are also HBOS customers. Each private shareholder holds an average of 374 shares and in October 2007 the largest interim dividend payment in the Group's history was paid out. Private shareholders received £130m in total.

History of HBOS

HBOS plc was established in September 2001 from the merger of the Halifax and Bank of Scotland, becoming the fifth largest financial services company in the UK, which has now progressed to becoming the fourth largest in the world. The Bank of Scotland itself was founded in 1695 by an Act of the Scots Parliament, making its Scotland's first and oldest bank. Halifax was founded in 1853 is one of the UK's best known companies.

HBOS established its corporate headquarters in Edinburgh. The building has been a key landmark in the Edinburgh skyline since it was completed in 1806. It has been the head office of Bank of Scotland since then and is now the headquarters for HBOS.

HBOS retained key divisional offices across the UK, including Retail in Halifax, Treasury Services in London, and Insurance and Investment services in Bristol.

HBOS today

Since it began trading in 2001, HBOS has seen phenomenal growth. Its profits have doubled, and its share of the current account market has gone up from 7% to 12%. It has 22 million customers which equates to two out of five UK householders.

Halifax and Bank of Scotland appeared over 1,200 times in “best buy” tables in during the first half of 2007. In total the Group has opened over 900,000 new accounts across its savings brands and it has opened more than 516,000 bank accounts and around 296,000 new credit card accounts. The net income in 2007 was £4,109 million.