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UNITED STATES
SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION
WASHINGTON, D.C. 20549
FORM 6-K
REPORT OF FOREIGN PRIVATE ISSUER PURSUANT TO RULE 13a-16 OR
15d-16
UNDER THE SECURITIES EXCHANGE ACT OF 1934
April, 2025
Commission File Number 001-10306
NatWest Group plc
250 Bishopsgate,
London, EC2M 4AA
United Kingdom
(Address
of principal executive offices)
Indicate
by check mark whether the registrant files or will file annual
reports under cover of Form 20-F or Form 40-F.
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Form 20-F ☒
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Form 40-F ☐
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The
following information was issued as Company announcements in
London, England and is furnished pursuant to General Instruction B
to the General Instructions to Form 6-K:
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NatWest Group plc
Annual General Meeting Statements
23 April 2025
NatWest Group plc will hold its Annual General Meeting at 10:00am
today. The meeting will deal with the proposed resolutions as set
out in the Notice of Meeting previously issued to
shareholders.
The following is an extract from the remarks to be made by Chair,
Rick Haythornthwaite and Group Chief Executive Officer, Paul
Thwaite at the meeting.
Rick Haythornthwaite
2024 was a year of significant progress for NatWest Group. And,
with positive momentum in our business, I am optimistic about the
opportunities ahead of us. We have a bank that is succeeding for
our customers and for our shareholders through a clear and focussed
business model that is delivering consistent profits, underpinned
by a strong balance sheet.
When I stood here last year, I said our return to private ownership
was in sight. And today, with the government shareholding now less
than 3%, that milestone is in reach. I will touch more on this
later, but first I want to give some insight into the issues that
have been occupying the minds of your Board and our leadership team
since we last spoke.
I have spent much of my first year getting to know this business;
taking the opportunity to meet our customers and colleagues and to
see for myself the relationships we have built and the vital role
we play in the lives of the customers and communities we
serve.
I have visited our Accelerator Hubs helping entrepreneurs to start
and scale their businesses, as well as commercial and corporate
managers who are providing the insight and expertise that more
established businesses need to grow in the UK and
overseas.
I have had the chance to immerse myself in some of the new
technology we are testing, having visited our data and tech teams
in the UK and India, as well as a number of the firms we are
collaborating with across the globe - from the biggest tech giants
to cutting edge start-ups.
And I have seen first-hand the energy and enthusiasm that our
colleagues have for supporting our customers and helping them to
succeed. I firmly believe that our strengths provide excellent
foundations for future growth.
As a bank that serves more than 19 million customers across all
nations and regions of the UK, the combination of our scale and our
deep-rooted local connections provide us with the data and insights
to better anticipate, understand and respond to their changing
needs. But our ability to capitalise on this opportunity and grow
is dependent on us becoming an even more integrated and
technology-enabled bank. At a time when competition is coming
from all corners, and when consumers have more choice than ever
before, this focus is paramount.
Throughout the course of the past 12 months, the Board has worked
closely with our leadership team on setting a strategy that
reflects the opportunity to deepen our existing relationships and
to create new ones. Both now and in the future. We have also given
a lot of thought to our culture and how we operate. Our
evolved purpose speaks to the positive role we play for our
customers and, in turn, the communities we serve.
As the bank that turns possibilities into progress, we need to
seize the opportunity in front of us, embedding a performance
culture and operating as a more dynamic and less bureaucratic
business by liberating our colleagues to ensure that our customers
get the best possible outcomes.
This focus on performance is reflected in the new remuneration
policy we are recommending you vote in favour of today. A policy
that is grounded in rewarding performance and which is much closer
aligned to our strategy. Our ambition is also reflected in some of
the new faces joining me on the stage today.
In July last year, we welcomed Geeta Gopalan as an independent
non-executive director, bringing with her substantial financial and
banking expertise, combined with a strong track record as a Board
member at other leading listed companies.
And then, in January, Gill Whitehead joined as the newest member of
your Board. Gill's deep knowledge and experience in data science
and digital transformation are highly relevant skills as we look to
shape the future of our bank.
At the same time, we have seen some notable departures. Our Senior
Independent Director, Mark Seligman, retired at the end of last
month having joined the bank in 2017, and I am pleased that Lena
Wilson agreed to assume Mark's role, while continuing to Chair the
Group Performance and Remuneration Committee.
Ian Cormack, Senior Independent Director of NatWest Holdings
Limited, has also indicated that he will shortly step down from the
Board of NatWest Holdings Limited.
Jan Cargill retired from her position as Chief Governance Officer
and Company Secretary in February after more than 35 years at the
bank, having started as a graduate back in 1989. Gary Moore, sat to
my left on stage today, has been appointed as Jan's
successor.
We also announced last week that, following a short period of
personal leave, Frank Dangeard has stepped down from his role as a
non-executive director of NatWest Group plc and Chair of NatWest
Markets with effect from today and will therefore not stand for
re-election.
I'd like to thank Mark, Ian, Jan and Frank for their dedicated
service to the bank - they have been highly valued colleagues who
have offered tremendous support to me personally, and they have
played an instrumental role in the bank's progress over recent
years.
The strength of NatWest Group today is evident from our
performance. And our strategy is delivering consistently for our
shareholders.
We saw a strong share price performance through the course of last
year, up more than 80%, and we were one of the top performing
companies in the FTSE for total shareholder returns. This momentum
has continued in 2025. We also announced £4 billion of capital
returns to shareholders for '24, including an interim dividend of
£500 million and a proposed final dividend of £1.2
billion.
These capital returns included two directed buybacks which,
alongside the ongoing trading plan, have helped to reduce the
Government's shareholding from around 38% at the start of 2024, to
less than 3% today.
For the first time since 2008, the Government is no longer the
biggest shareholder in the bank, and we are on the verge of a
return to full private ownership. This will be a symbolic
moment, marking a new, forward-looking chapter in our
story.
If I think back to 2008, I was Chair of MasterCard at the time. And
whilst we weren't at the epicentre of the crisis, our customers and
colleagues certainly were. It was a time of extraordinary
uncertainty that required extraordinary action.
And it is important that we recognise the bold decision taken by
the government of the day to step in and stabilise our banking
system and, by extension, our economy.
We remain incredibly grateful to the government, and to UK
taxpayers, for their intervention and support, which protected
millions of savers, homeowners and businesses at a time of global
crisis.
And whilst a return to full private ownership has long been a
shared ambition, the government has been a positive and patient
shareholder through the intervening years, enabling us to undertake
the substantial change required to become the simpler, safer,
customer-focussed bank we are today.
Of course, it is not just NatWest Group that has fundamentally
changed since 2008. The regulatory environment is also vastly
different and significantly improved, so too the culture and
governance of organisations across the UK. As a result, the
banking sector as a whole is stronger
and safer. And those that lead and work in these institutions are
rightly held to higher standards.
Critically, the continued pace of technological change, along with
increases in competition, have changed the way people live and work
beyond recognition, including how they access financial services
and manage their money. Now, customers can choose to bank wherever
and however they want, at any time of day or night.
We are at an inflection point not just in our bank's history, but
in the context in which we're operating. After almost two
decades of recovery for our banks, and for our country and economy
more widely, growth is rightly at the top of the national agenda.
And, despite ongoing geopolitical uncertainty, competition and
innovation are in focus once more.
It is clear that the rhetoric is changing and we must keep up the
momentum in order to create a secure, competitive environment that
promotes growth, all in the service of the customer.
Financial services can drive investment and job creation with the
right foundations and support in place. And NatWest is ready
to step up to the challenge. We have fixed the issues of the past
and have the scale and presence in communities around the country
to leverage our balance sheet by lending to our customers and
driving economic growth.
At the same time, we have a new leadership team and a strategy that
is delivering, with a focus on embracing technology to seize the
opportunities in front of us.
Supporting our customers to meet their own ambitions, whether that
is buying a home, setting up or scaling a business or investing
their money, is ultimately how we will succeed. And how we
will win together, for our customers, our shareholders and wider UK
economy.
Paul Thwaite
Our strong performance in 2024 was reflected in our upgraded income
and returns guidance, both of which we exceeded, with underlying
income of £14.6bn and a Return on Tangible Equity of 17.5%.
And we have made excellent progress against our three
strategic priorities as we deliver on our ambition to succeed with
our customers.
Our first priority is disciplined growth and we saw increases in
both lending and deposits last year, as well as assets under
management. Critically, this growth is grounded in the support and
services we provide to more than 19 million customers across the
UK, with around half a million new customers choosing to bank with
us in 2024.
Our support comes in many forms. Whether helping more than 350,000
mortgage customers to buy or refinance their homes, including over
35,000 first time buyers. Or increasing our assets under management
and administration by 20% as we help customers to save and invest
for their future. And, for commercial customers, we underscored our
position as the number one bank for business in the UK, growing our
lending by £10billion and welcoming over 90,000 new startups
to NatWest.
To accelerate this organic growth, we also announced two
significant acquisitions from Metro Bank and Sainsbury's Bank.
These build on existing areas of strength, at attractive returns,
in line with our strategic priorities.
Our second area of focus is bank-wide simplification, which is
designed to increase efficiency, whilst improving our customers'
experience of banking with us. Our investment in further digital
transformation allows us to adapt and innovate, helping us to
anticipate and respond to customers' changing needs faster and more
effectively.
In retail banking, around 80% of customers bank with us entirely
digitally. For mortgage customers, we reduced by 20% the average
time it takes for us to make an offer during the course of last
year. This is a process that used to take weeks. For some eligible
customers, we can now make an offer within 24 hours.
In our commercial business, we are making it faster and easier to
access more of the products and services our customers need, from
FX services to small business loans, including a new proposition
which allows high growth businesses to secure lending against their
intellectual property.
AI, and particularly the use of Generative AI, are an important
part of this and we're seeing benefits both for our customers and
for our colleagues. For example:
o Cora,
our AI chatbot that helps customers with everyday banking queries,
handled over 18m interactions last year alone.
o And,
since the introduction of a Generative AI pilot, we've seen a 150%
increase in customer satisfaction.
o For
our internal equivalent, Ask Archie+, up to 75% of HR queries are
now answered directly through this tool.
These advances not only save our customers time and improve the
service we provide, they also save time for our colleagues, who can
then focus on more complex queries and solutions.
Alongside our digital transformation, we are also taking deliberate
decisions to simplify our operations, for example by reducing our
property footprint and exiting our hub in Poland.
Our third strategic priority is a focus on active balance sheet and
risk management, which is the foundation of a good
bank.
This has helped us to drive strong capital generation which, in
turn, enables us to support our customers, invest in the business
and make distributions to you, our shareholders. The
progress we have made and the work we have done to consider our
strategy during the past year, give us even greater conviction that
these are the right priorities to help us
succeed.
And we will continue to grow with our customers; accelerate our
plan for bank wide simplification and take advantage of the
strength of our balance sheet by allocating capital strategically
to optimise returns, and dynamically in changing market
environments.
At the time of my appointment last February, I said that we should
not underestimate the strength of our foundations; whether that's
the scale and depth of our customer relationships, our robust
balance sheet or our leading market positions across our three
businesses.
The enterprise-wide strategy we've developed as a leadership team,
and agreed as a Board, is anchored in these competitive advantages
and the opportunity we have to deepen our customer relationships
and build new ones.
At a time when customers are facing into multiple technological,
environmental and social changes, we can grow with them as a vital
and trusted partner. That's why we are using data and insights to
anticipate, understand and respond to their changing needs faster
and more effectively.
Customer expectations are changing too. Today, we expect the
companies we interact with to be a step ahead: to understand our
personal requirements and ultimately to make our lives
easier.
And our continued investment in technology ensures we can serve our
customers how, when and where they want, whilst keeping them safe
and improving our productivity. AI is undoubtably a key
enabler to that ambition. And our roll out of AI across the bank is
quietly reinventing how we operate for the better.
To this end, we recently announced that we are the first
UK-headquartered bank to be working with Open AI as part of a
collaboration that has the potential to accelerate how quickly and
widely we can deploy some of the latest developments in Gen
AI.
As Rick mentioned, this is a significant year for NatWest,
particularly as we approach our return to full private ownership.
Although there is no strategic or operational impact of the
government exit, the accelerated sell down over the last 18 months
is testament to the performance of the business and has helped us
to attract new global investors who share our growth ambitions.
There is no doubt that this moment matters.
It matters for our colleagues, especially those based in the
UK, over
a third of whom worked here in 2008 and have played an important
role in the fundamental change that has taken place. It matters for
the UK as it helps turn the page on the global financial crisis,
with a healthy, restructured and well-capitalised banking sector
that is able to support the investment and innovation required to
deliver UK-wide growth.
And it matters to me personally. I am pleased and proud to have
been part of the team that has helped transform NatWest into a
simpler, safer, customer focussed bank. And I am sincerely grateful
to the UK taxpayer for the intervention that made it
possible.
Our ambition today is to succeed with our customers. Having
long been defined by our past, we can now look forward with
confidence and optimism about the opportunities ahead, without
forgetting the lessons of the financial crisis.
At a time when there is a clear national intent to deliver growth,
a stronger NatWest is able to play a vital role, shaping our future
as a vital and trusted partner to our customers and to the UK
itself. This is a sector that matters; strong economies need strong
banks. And, across NatWest Group, we are fully focussed on
delivery.
Because, ultimately, if we succeed with our customers, we win
together; for our colleagues, our communities and our
shareholders.
Forward-looking statements
This announcement may include forward-looking statements within the
meaning of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform
Act of 1995, such as statements with respect to NatWest Group's
financial condition, results of operations and business, including
its strategic priorities, financial, investment and capital
targets, and climate and sustainability related targets,
commitments and ambitions described herein. Statements that are not
historical facts, including statements about NatWest Group's
beliefs and expectations, are forward-looking statements. Words,
such as 'expect', 'estimate', 'project', 'anticipate', 'commit',
'believe', 'should', 'intend', 'will', 'plan', 'could', 'target',
'goal', 'objective', 'may', 'outlook', 'prospects' and similar
expressions or variations on these expressions are intended to
identify forward-looking statements. In particular, this
announcement may include forward-looking statements relating , but
not limited to: NatWest Group's outlook, guidance and targets
(including in relation to RoTE, total income, other operating
expenses, loan impairment rate, CET1 ratio, RWA levels, payment of
dividends and participation in directed buybacks), its financial
position, profitability and financial performance, the
implementation of its strategy, its access to adequate sources of
liquidity and funding, its regulatory capital position and related
requirements, its impairment losses and credit exposures under
certain specified scenarios, substantial regulation and oversight,
ongoing legal, regulatory and governmental actions and
investigations. Forward-looking
statements are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties that
might cause actual results and performance to differ materially
from any expected future results or performance expressed or
implied by the forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause
or contribute to differences in current expectations include, but
are not limited to, future growth initiatives (including
acquisitions, joint ventures and strategic partnerships), the
outcome of legal, regulatory and governmental actions and
investigations, the level and extent of future impairments and
write-downs, legislative, political, fiscal and regulatory
developments, accounting standards, competitive conditions,
technological developments, interest and exchange rate
fluctuations, general economic and political conditions and
uncertainties, exposure to third party risk, operational risk,
conduct risk, cyber, data and IT risk, financial crime risk, key
person risk and credit rating risk and the impact of climate and
sustainability related risks and the transitioning to a net zero
economy. These and other factors, risks and uncertainties that may
impact any forward-looking statement or NatWest Group plc's actual
results are discussed in NatWest Group plc's 2024 Annual Report on
Form 20-F, and its other public filings. The forward-looking
statements contained in this announcement speak only as of the date
of this announcement and NatWest Group plc does not assume or
undertake any obligation or responsibility to update any of the
forward-looking statements contained in this announcement, whether
as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except
to the extent legally required.
Name of contact and telephone number for queries:-
Investor Relations
+ 44 (0)207 672 1758
Media Relations
+44 (0)131 523 4205
Legal Entity Identifier:
2138005O9XJIJN4JPN90
SIGNATURE
Pursuant to the
requirements of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, the registrant
has duly caused this report to be signed on its behalf by the
undersigned, thereunto duly authorized.
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NatWest Group plc
(Registrant)
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Date:
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23
April 2025
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By:
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/s/
Mark Stevens
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Name:
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Mark
Stevens
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Title:
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Assistant
Secretary
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