LONDON & EDINBURGH, Scotland--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Mar 31, 2025--
Hampden Bank has announced continued strong growth, chair Simon Miller’s retirement, and expansion plans for 2025.
This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20250331723475/en/
In its annual results for 2024, both deposits and lending grew by double-digits while the number of clients reached 6,000, supported by introductions from clients and professional advisers.
Total deposits across current, call, notice, and term accounts increased by 16 percent year-on-year to £991 million (2023: £858m).
Total lending increased by 20 percent year-on-year to £586 million (2023: £488m), on the back of strong demand as interest rates stabilised.
The bank registered a pre-tax profit of £8.2 million, down from £9.1m in 2024, reflecting the higher cost of deposits and continued investment in people and technology. The bank relaunched its digital banking app in November 2024.
The board has proposed a dividend to shareholders of 3.2p per share, doubling last year’s inaugural dividend.
The bank moved to new premises in Edinburgh in March and will move to larger offices in London over the summer. It also announced that it will expand its footprint, serving the North and Midlands from a new Manchester base this year.
Tracey Davidson, who joined the bank as CEO in October 2024, said: “These results and our plans for future growth are evidence of strong demand for personalised banking, delivered with exceptional service. As we celebrate our tenth anniversary in 2025, we are excited to welcome clients to our new offices in Edinburgh and London, and to build relationships with clients and professional partners in the North and Midlands from a new Manchester base.”
The bank also announced that chair Simon Miller will retire in August. David Huntley, a non-executive director since 2020, has been chosen as the next chair, subject to regulatory approval.
Simon Miller said: “I have thoroughly enjoyed my term as chair of Hampden Bank. I welcome the board’s appointment of David Huntley as my successor, subject to regulatory approval. David joined the board not long after me as chair of the risk committee. He is a trained actuary and draws on a distinguished executive, board and consultancy career, latterly as chair of Scottish Friendly. He has a deep knowledge of the bank, its culture and ethos. I leave the bank in good hands as it prepares for its next phase of growth.”
Tracey Davidson added: “As a founding shareholder, Simon believed in the vision of building a new private bank dedicated to providing exceptional client service. As chair, he held true to that vision and took great interest in supporting and developing our people to deliver it. I thank him on behalf of the board and all at Hampden Bank. We are delighted that David has agreed to be our next chair. I look forward to working with him to write the next chapter in the bank’s story.”
David Huntley said: “I believe passionately that the relentless focus on client service, which has characterised the bank in its first decade, is the cornerstone of its future growth.”
About Hampden Bank
Hampden Bank is a private bank providing exceptional client service delivered by outstanding banking professionals.
Hampden Bank CEO Tracey Davidson
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. President Donald Trump said Friday he’s holding a White House Situation Room meeting with his advisers as he looks to make a “final determination” on moving forward with a deal to extend the Iran ceasefire and reopen the Strait of Hormuz. Iran said the deal has not been finalized.
Trump confirmed the high-level talks the day after The Associated Press and other news outlets reported that U.S. and Iranian negotiators had come to terms on a tentative agreement. The deal would extend the fragile ceasefire by 60 days as new talks are held on Iran’s disputed nuclear program.
Trump wrote on social media that “Iran must agree that they will never have a Nuclear Weapon or Bomb.” He said the strait must be reopened for international navigation and all sea mines destroyed.
Iran’s main negotiator said Friday that it has “no trust in guarantees or words,” only actions, underscoring lingering distrust after the U.S. and Israel have twice attacked Iran over the past year while it was engaged in nuclear negotiations.
“No step will be taken before the other side acts,” Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf wrote on X. “We do not gain concessions through talks, but through missiles."
Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei later told a state broadcaster that the agreement “has not been finalized yet.”
On Thursday, U.S. Vice President JD Vance suggested negotiators were trying to strike general terms on Iran’s nuclear program, with the specifics to be hammered out in the ensuing talks.
Trump and his team said from the start of the conflict that a prime objective was to ensure that Iran can never have a nuclear weapon, but Vance framed the war’s accomplishments more modestly.
“We’re in a position where we could substantially set back their nuclear program, not just during the term of this president but over the long term,” Vance said, adding that it would be “very, very good” for Americans.
Baghaei, however, said Friday that Iranian officials were "focused on the end of war and are not discussing the details of the nuclear plan at this point.”
Iran also wants any deal to include a truce between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah militants in Lebanon, where fighting has intensified despite a nominal ceasefire.
The Islamic Republic has 440.9 kilograms (972 pounds) of uranium that is enriched up to 60% purity, a short, technical step from weapons-grade levels of 90%, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Iran has long maintained its nuclear program is peaceful and has not publicly committed to giving up the stockpile. It's believed to be buried under three nuclear sites that were badly damaged by U.S. strikes last year.
Trump returned Friday to his on-and-off demand for the removal of the cache as part of a deal. The material would be unearthed by the U.S., in coordination with Iran and the IAEA, “and DESTROYED,” he posted.
The proposed memorandum makes clear that Iran would not be able to impose tolls on the Strait of Hormuz and that it would have to remove all mines from the vital waterway within 30 days, according to a U.S. official who was not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
The U.S. would gradually lift its blockade on Iranian ports and would also agree to relax sanctions, allowing Iran to sell more of its oil.
Baghaei said Iran and Oman, which lie on opposite sides of the strait, would manage it and “adopt mechanisms” for transit through it, "based on their own national interests and the interests of the international community.”
The two nations' foreign ministers discussed the issue by phone earlier Friday, according to Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, who wrote on X that he had expressed solidarity “in the face of any threat.”
On Wednesday, Trump had warned Oman — a U.S. ally — not to enter into any agreement with Iran to share control of the strait or the U.S. will “have to blow them up.”
Iran has effectively closed the strait since the U.S. and Israel launched a surprise attack on Feb. 28 that killed Iran's supreme leader and other top officials. Before then, the waterway was open to international traffic, and around a fifth of the world's oil and gas passed through it.
The closure of the strait has caused the price of fuel and other goods to soar, with the effects felt far beyond the Middle East.
Iran has said it lets some commercial vessels pass — about two dozen daily in recent days, compared with more than 100 a day before the war. But the Islamic Republic also has charged tolls for at least some ships and established a formal gatekeeper agency earlier this month, spurring a new round of U.S. sanctions this week.
Since the ceasefire began about seven weeks ago, the U.S. and Iran have traded strikes and accusations of ceasefire violations. But they have not returned to full-scale hostilities and have kept negotiating.
Associated Press writers Jennifer Peltz and Farnoush Amiri in New York, and Matthew Lee in Washington, contributed.
Men ride on their motorbike at the historic neighborhood of Oudlajan in Tehran, Iran, Thursday, May 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
People cross an intersection in front of a billboard showing a portrait of the late Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, who was killed in a helicopter crash in 2024, in downtown Tehran, Iran, Thursday, May 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
