Coventry Building Society's new subsidiary, The Co-op Bank, has reported a boom in mortgage applications in its first set of financial results since the acquisition.
Despite a slight dip in pre-tax profit for 2024, down to £116.2m from £120.9m in 2023, the results were in line with company expectations, as reported by .
Lower mortgage margins and increased savings rates impacted net interest income, leading to dampened profits.
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However, mortgage applications saw a significant increase, surging 50 per cent to £3.44bn, compared to £2.26bn in 2023.
The bank attributed this to simplifying its IT infrastructure, which allowed for faster responses and larger loans. The average loan size rose to £207k from £159k.
Interim chief executive Steve Hughes said: "The bank has made significant progress in simplifying its IT infrastructure, delivering the commitment to exit legacy platforms and data centres and bring £19bn of mortgage balances and £5bn of savings balances onto a single system."
In addition to its IT transformation, the bank launched several switching campaigns in 2024 to attract and retain customers, resulting in positive net current account switching for the first time in over a decade.
Despite rising inflation and an increase in customer fraud remediation costs, the lender managed to reduce costs by one per cent to £390.7m.
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Coventry Building Society finalised its £780m takeover of the bank on January 2, 2025, returning the lender to mutual ownership.
Hughes remarked: "I am delighted to welcome The Co-Operative Bank to Coventry Building Society, bringing the original ethical bank once again into the ownership of a mutual organisation. "
"In these first weeks as interim Chief Executive Officer, I have been hugely impressed by the dedication of my new colleagues in serving our customers at a time of significant change."