Also, RBS/NatWest was forced to sell assets such as Direct Line, Citizens Bank and a 5% stake in the Bank of China into a ‘buyers’ market’, with Lloyds Banking Group, wholly committed to mortgage lending through the Halifax with The Cheltenham & Gloucester Building Society eventually being ‘hived-off’ to TSB Bank’s portfolio in 2013. The final nail in Lloyds Banking’s coffin was the sale of Scottish Widows to Aberdeen Asset Management in 2014.
