APPG on Fair Business Banking raises ‘deep concerns’ over rumoured hedge fund bid for Cooperative Bank

The All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Fair Business Banking has published a letter from its co-chair, Kevin Hollinrake, to the governor of the Bank of England, Andrew Bailey, regarding the rumoured bid for the Cooperative Bank by the US hedge fund, Cerberus. While Hollinrake acknowledges that such an approach has not yet been confirmed by the bank, he raises his ‘deep concerns’ about the possibility.

The letter highlights the Cerberus £13.3bn acquisition of the former Northern Rock mortgage book in 2015, which it says left 270,000 mortgage customers with lower levels of regulatory protection. Hollinrake recalls Bailey’s acknowledgment earlier this year, when he was chief executive of the FCA, that the regulator does not have the same level of regulatory oversight of offshore inactive lenders as it does over