The building society reported a statutory pre-tax profit of £1.8bn for the year to April 4, down about a fifth from the £2.2bn reported this time last year. The lender said the decline was largely due to the £344m handed out to members in June last year, as well as it passing on interest rate rises to savers. On Thursday, it also announced it will pay out another bonus to eligible members in June this year, amounting to about £385m in total.
Chris Rhodes, Nationwide’s finance chief, revealed that the mortgage market was down about 27 per cent over the latest year, with buy-to-let lending plunging nearly 50 per cent. “As we look forward, we do expect the market to gradually improve, both as affordability improves from falling interest rates, and with wage inflation running ahead of CPI inflation,” he said. “But it is going to be gradual, and as we look at house price data it is going to be a bit lumpy.