Lloyds Banking Group said on Thursday it would invest more than £13 billion in digital services, including a new smart wallet, as it reported a 23 per cent rise in statutory profit before tax to £4.3 billion in the first half of 2026.
The FTSE 100 lender has laid out the plan, which it calls Accelerate 2030, and its half-yearly results. Lloyds said the business plan would make “money easier, safer and more connected” for its 28 million customers.
Net interest income, the difference between what the bank charged borrowers and what it paid savers, rose by 9 per cent to £7.3 billion, boosting total income by 9 per cent to £9.7 billion. The bank attributed the improvement to higher profit margins and cost cutting, and cut its expected loan loss provision to £3.3 billion. The profit figure was ahead of expectations.
Charlie Nunn, chief executive, said: “In the first half of 2026, we have delivered continued strength in financial performance, with revenue growth, improved operating capacity, debt efficiency, incremental capital growth and increased shareholder returns.”
The bank, the UK's biggest consumer lender, said it would raise its interim dividend by 30 per cent to 1.58p per share and start a 1 billion share buyback plan. Barclays, which reported second-quarter pre-tax profit rose 31 per cent to £3.3 billion on Tuesday, also unveiled a £1 billion cash return.
Lloyds said it would double the size of its small business lending group and deliver more than £45 billion of new loans. The pledge follows a government-backed task force that convened in February to unlock £1 billion of extra money for small firms, citing figures from the British Business Bank which put loan rejection rates at high street banks at around 40 per cent.
The smart wallet will use technology Lloyds acquired through its acquisition of Curve, a mobile app that provides a digital wallet for multiple debit and credit cards. Lloyds bought Curve in November last year for £120 million in a deal the bank said would give customers “extended payment freedom”.
The application allows customers to switch payments to different cards after a purchase, saving on any credit payments received by mistake, and has the ability to set rules to help ensure that certain types of transactions are only issued through certain channels.
The bank said it will also develop an in-system transportation platform to create a financial market for vehicles, leasing, insurance, energy, travel and related products.
Lloyds said it will deliver total cost savings of nearly $2 billion by deploying technology to automate processes and improve the productivity of its workforce. In its half-year performance account, the group said it had about 22 million mobile app users logging in about seven billion times a year, and that it had generated about $30 billion in new revenue from small business customers by 2023.
In terms of housing, the bank said it intends to double the size of its rental housing portfolio to 20,000 and will reduce the time it takes customers to complete a home purchase from “weeks to days”.
The strategy follows a series of decisions to consolidate the group's retail operations. Lloyds said in early July that the Halifax brand would change to Lloyds in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, making Lloyds the only consumer banking brand in those markets, after reports in May that the 173-year-old name was to be withdrawn. The group has also confirmed the closure of another 95 branches between May this year and March 2027, which will leave it with 610 sites.
Nunn and William Chalmers, chief financial officer, presented the results and revised strategy to investors at 9.30am on Thursday. Lloyds said Accelerate 2030 covers the period from 2027 to 2030 and is built on what it described as a re-imagining of the customer experience, increased team communication and a change in the manufacturing process.
