Latest news

28 November 2024

The takeover of the Co-operative Bank by Coventry Building Society has been approved by the Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority, clearing the last hurdle to completion of the deal.

The takeover will now complete on 1 January 2025.

At its annual gathering in November 2024 members of the Customer Union for Ethical Banking agreed to keep the organisation going. However, the organisation plans to retire the 'Save Our Bank" name, arguing that this job is now done.

Following the latest news the Customer Union for Ethical Banking said:

Bank back in mutual ownership

24 May 2024

The Co-operative Bank and Coventry Building Society have announced they had completed a deal for the bank to be acquired by the society.

Bob Dench, chair of the bank said:

“This transaction sees The Co-operative Bank returning to mutuality. I am very proud of all those who have worked so hard over so many years to rebuild the Bank. I am sure the Coventry Building Society will prove to be a very good home for us.”

The Co-op Bank has new entered 'exclusive' merger talks with Coventry Building Society. This is now officially confirmed.

Starting with the Financial Times, which included a quote from the Customer Union, a number of media outlets have now picked up on the story.

https://www.ft.com/content/cee13985-7dad-4710-b9a2-49f0e9258134 (Paywall)

We commented to the FT:

"The Customer Union for Ethical Banking, the independent union for Co-op’s customers, said a successful deal would “align perfectly with our dual goals: preserving the bank’s world-leading ethical standards and steering it back towards some form of mutual or co-operative ownership.”

28 April 2021

JC Flowers and Bain Capital Credit have agreed to buy BlueMountain Capital’s share in the Co-op Bank. The acquisition remains subject to regulatory approval.

Nick Slape, Chief Executive Officer of the Co-operative Bank, commented:

We asked members of the Customer Union (and Save Our Bank supporters) to send in questions that they'd like us to ask the Co-operative Bank at our regular meeting with them in September 2020.

We assembled - and in some cases amalgamated - a list of questions from members before presenting them to the bank for initial discussion. The bank then went away to consider a more detailed response, and there was a further dialogue. It's taken a while for us to collate the responses and write this up. We'll try and turn this round more quickly in future.

The issues covered are listed below. Click on a subject for details of our question and the bank’s responses.

January 2021

The Co-operative Bank has announced that it has renewed its support for The Hive – a programme delivered by Co-operatives UK to support new co‑operative start-ups, help grow existing co‑ops and help business convert to co-operative or community ownership.

The Hive was launched in 2016, and has already received £1.3 million in funding from the bank. This has helped over 1,000 co-operatives and groups with support including direct business advice, workshops, training and mentoring.