JC Flowers targets UK banks' mortgage books with £1.5bn 'war chest'

The US firm, founded and run by former Goldman Sachs banker Christopher Flowers, is to move to what one source called its "Plan B" for the UK market after it lost out to Virgin Money in the £1bn auction for the state-owned bank, according to the Daily Telegraph. The move also follows its failure to secure the purchase of Principality, the UK's seventh largest building society, which it had hoped to merge into its OneSavings Bank vehicle, which was formed from its acquisition of the Kent Reliance Building Society last year. Rather than buy mutuals, which to date has not proven to be a ...