Former Lloyds chief appointed to Bank of Ireland governorship

By KRISTY DORSEY
Published on 21/06/2012 00:00

ARCHIE Kane, the former head of Lloyds Banking Group in Scotland, will be the next governor of Bank of Ireland as the country’s largest consumer lender continues its push back towards profitability.

Kane joins the bank with immediate effect and will take over from Pat Molloy on 29 June. Kane joins the board, known as the “court of governors”, along with new non-executives Prem Watsa, head of Canada’s Fairfax Financial Holdings, and US billionaire Wilbur Ross Jr.

Kane, 60, was Lloyds’ most senior Scottish executive, with responsibility for the group’s Scottish Widows insurance arm and banking operations north of the Border.

He retired from the board in May last year as part of a management restructuring led by incoming Lloyds chief executive Antonio Horta-Osorio. Kane was also among the five executive directors and eight further senior managers forced earlier this year by Lloyds to hand back more than £2 million of bonuses in the wake of the payment protection insurance (PPI) scandal.

Kane’s background in running a partially state-controlled operation is expected to benefit him at Bank of Ireland, which is 15.1 per cent owned by the Irish government.

The Dublin-based lender escaped outright state control last July after selling a 34.9 per cent stake to five North American investors in a €1.1 billion (£887m) deal. Lloyds, the UK’s second-largest lender, is 41 per cent government-owned after receiving at £20.3bn rescue package.

Molloy said Kane’s experience would be a “major asset” that would allow him to “make a very meaningful contribution to the on-going development of the group’s Irish business”.

Bank of Ireland reported a huge narrowing in pre-tax losses for 2011, though operating profits more than halved amid continuing challenging conditions in its core home market.