The bank’s underlying profit in the nine months to the end of September increased by £2.551 billion to £4.426 billion, it said. For the first nine months of this year, the bank also made a pre-tax profit of £1.694 billion, it said in a statement today.

Net interest income for the quarter was £2.761 billion, a rise of 7 per cent from a year before; the bank logged impairments of £670 million, narrowing by 47 per cent from the impairments of a year ago.

“Profit and returns in the core business improved substantially, with underlying profit up 20 per cent to £5,549 million, and the return on risk-weighted assets increasing by 60 basis points to 3.17 per cent,” Lloyds’ chief executive, António Horta-Osório, said in the statement.

At the end of the third quarter, the bank had a core Tier 1 capital ratio of 1.5 per cent, compared with 12 per cent at the end of December 2012.

The statement today gave few numbers on its wealth management arm, although it referred to St James's Place (which has reported a few days ago). 

In late May, Lloyds sold its International Private Banking business in Miami to Spain’s Banco Sabadell for an all-cash sum of up to £8 million ($12.1 million). This move happened shortly after Lloyds said it was selling its Geneva-based private bank to Union Bancaire Privée, and followed the sale of its Spanish retail operations to Banco Sabadell in April.