Authorities sells closing NatWest shares 17 years after bailout

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Your help makes all of the distinction. Learn extra The federal government has offered its remaining shares in NatWest, finalising the financial institution's return to non-public possession for the primary time because it was bailed out throughout the 2008 monetary disaster.

The Treasury has been a stakeholder since NatWest, previously often called RBS, obtained virtually £46 billion of funding in 2008 and 2009.

To this point, £35 billion has been returned to the Exchequer by share gross sales, dividends and costs, that means the sale has come at a £10.5 billion loss to taxpayers.

The federal government and managers at NatWest stated it was a major milestone because the bailout, which prevented the financial institution’s collapse.

<img src="https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/05/29/15/288cfee3a1560680510343c310e54fa6Y29udGVudHNlYXJjaGFwaSwxNzQ4NjEzNjU1-2.80228882.jpg" srcset="https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/05/29/15/288cfee3a1560680510343c310e54fa6Y29udGVudHNlYXJjaGFwaSwxNzQ4NjEzNjU1-2.80228882.jpg?quality=75&width=320&auto=webp 320w, https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/05/29/15/288cfee3a1560680510343c310e54fa6Y29udGVudHNlYXJjaGFwaSwxNzQ4NjEzNjU1-2.80228882.jpg?quality=75&width=640&auto=webp 640w" loading="lazy" alt="Chancellor Rachel Reeves said NatWest’s return to private ownership “turns the page on a significant chapter in this country’s history”" class="sc-1mc30lb-0 ggpMaE inline-gallery-btn"/> open picture in gallery

Chancellor Rachel Reeves stated NatWest’s return to non-public possession “turns the web page on a major chapter on this nation’s historical past” (Hannah McKay/PA) Chancellor Rachel Reeves stated: “Practically 20 years in the past, the then-government stepped in to guard hundreds of thousands of savers and companies from the results of the collapse of RBS.

“That was the precise choice then to safe the financial system, and NatWest’s return to non-public possession turns the web page on a major chapter on this nation’s historical past.”

Chief govt Paul Thwaite stated it's a “vital second for NatWest Group, for all those that work right here and for the UK extra extensively”.

“As we flip the web page on the monetary disaster, we are able to look to the long run with confidence, with out forgetting the teachings of the previous.”

The Treasury has been step by step promoting its shares since 2015, however the course of has accelerated previously yr because it took benefit of the financial institution’s rising share value.

<img src="https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/03/26/12/04/GettyImages-1915322188.jpg" srcset="https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/03/26/12/04/GettyImages-1915322188.jpg?quality=75&width=320&crop=3%3A2%2Csmart&trim=0%2C0%2C0%2C0&auto=webp 320w, https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/03/26/12/04/GettyImages-1915322188.jpg?quality=75&width=640&crop=3%3A2%2Csmart&trim=0%2C0%2C0%2C0&auto=webp 640w" loading="lazy" alt="Rick Haythornthwaite, NatWest Group’s chairman, said it was a ‘rescue, not an investment’" class="sc-1mc30lb-0 ggpMaE inline-gallery-btn"/> open picture in gallery

Rick Haythornthwaite, NatWest Group’s chairman, stated it was a ‘rescue, not an funding’ (AFP by way of Getty Pictures) Rick Haythornthwaite, NatWest Group’s chairman, stated: “Hopefully, it is a second once we can consign the good monetary disaster to the previous.”

“It’s very troublesome to overstate the significance of what the taxpayer did for the corporate and for the nation as an entire,” he stated, stressing that it was a “rescue, not an funding”.

“There’s little question that the banking sector, the monetary providers sector as an entire, is way stronger than it was 17 years in the past.

“The tradition of the businesses is basically totally different … method totally different to the short-term beneficial properties that they was (targeted on).”