RBS reports third quarter loss

The state owned bank has had to set aside £425m to cover litigation costs for legacy mortgage related cases.

Taxpayer-controlledRoyal Bank of Scotland has posted a £469m loss for the July-September as well as setting aside £425m to cover litigation costs for legacy mortgage related cases.

The£425m for litigation and misconduct includes settling legal cases in the US relating to the selling of residential mortgage-backed securities before thecrisis.

The lender hasalso run up £469m of restructuring charges, partly due to its struggles to sell its Williams & Glyn branch network.

The lender now admits that it won’t sell the networkby the end of 2017, as it had earlier hoped. Yesterday Clydesdale Bank made an offer for the 300 branch network even if the pair find an agreement the process of divesting Williams & Glyn will take longer than the deadline.

However once restructuring costs and provision for litigation were excluded, the bank made an adjusted quarterly operating profit of £1.3bn.

Early trading saw RBS shares up 5%.