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Alliance and Leicester plc is a British bank, formely a building society. It was formed in 1997 by the floatation of the former Alliance and Leicester Building Society on the London Stock Exchange. It listed on the FTSE 100. Its headquarters are in Carlton Park, a business estate in Narborough, south of Leicester in England.The four business sectors are: mortgage lending & investments, personal banking , commercial banking and treasury. The Group provides general insurance, life assurance, unit trusts , personal current accounts and credit cards, asset financing and commercial lending . Its main business is in the United Kingdom concentrating on mortgages, current accounts, savings and insurance products.
The former building society was formed by the merger of the Alliance Building Society and the Leicester Building Society in the early 1980s. Later the society acquired Girobank , a major banking services provider to small businesses from the Post Office. With other large building societies such as the Halifax and WoolwichThe Woolwich Building Society was founded in 1847, and was one of the first permanent building societies. 1997 The Woolwich Building Society demutualised, losing its mutual status to become a plc. Woolwich plc was formed, which sold its shares on the Lond, the Alliance and Leicester decided to float the society on the London Stock Exchange, generating windfall payments to members worth up to £5,000 each.
In the years after floatation, the Alliance and Leicester has not been a star performer in the banking world. Its small size means it cannot compete with the larger UK banks on a large scale. It also has no international market. However, restructuring and the booming UK housing market has powered profit growth.
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Banks of the United Kingdom
