LONDON (Reuters) -British supermarket Sainsbury’s said on Thursday it would wind down its own banking business and instead offer financial products through third parties, as part of its strategy to focus on its core retail offering.
Sainsbury’s, Britain’s second largest grocer, said it would switch to a distributed model for banking, with products provided by dedicated financial services companies.
“Over time this will result in a phased withdrawal from our core Banking business,” the company said in a statement.
The move follows a review of its financial services.
Sainsbury’s said it already sold insurance like this.
The company in August divested its mortgage portfolio, which comprised 3,500 customers and balances of about 479 million pounds, to the UK-based Co-operative Bank.
The supermarket’s chief executive Simon Roberts said the move away from financial services was in line with its focus on retail, where it also owns furniture and electricals chain Argos.
“We have been clear since we launched our Food First strategy in 2020 that we would concentrate our efforts on our core retail businesses,” he said.
Jim Brown will retire from his role as chief executive of Sainsbury’s Bank, the company said, and Robert Mulhall, former boss of Allied Irish Bank’s UK division, had been named to replace him.
Customers of Sainsbury’s Bank would not notice any immediate change, the company said.
(Reporting by Sarah Young, Editing by Paul Sandle)
