For all of those wobbly-kneed status quo types who are afraid to take on the banks, read on. Massive failures as we have today from big banks will always create new opportunities for someone else. Always. In the UK it is retailer Tesco and now Richard Branson who are keen to step in and create rival banks to take on the old boy network who probably also play tennis with their Treasury chief. Branson has always enjoyed a good fight against the large players in an industry so this should turn out to be another success for everyone, consumers included. Why not in the US too?
Richard Branson is to launch an internet bank in a move designed to exploit public disgust with Britain's big banks in the wake of the credit crunch.If only someone in the US was allowed to create a viable competitor. No, then we might have competition and then what would we do?
Branson follows Tesco, which is also planning to capitalise on disenchantment with traditional banking via a big push into financial services.
The entrepreneur will act through his Virgin Money subsidiary, which is headed by Jayne-Anne Gadhia, a former boss of RBS's mortgage division and marketing director of Norwich Union.
Virgin Money is understood to be poised to apply for a banking licence from the Financial Services Authority to allow it to take deposits and offer mortgages for the first time. Branson is talking to US investment banks and other investors about financial backing.
