J.C. Flowers and Bain Capital Credit to Buy into Recovering Co-Op Bank

The Co-operative Bank said on Wednesday that J.C. Flowers and Bain Capital Credit had agreed to buy a stake in the company from an existing investor, alongside results that showed the lender’s turnaround was ahead of schedule.

The two buyout groups were set to buy the 10.01% of the company’s A shares and 12.05% of the B shares currently owned by BlueMountain, Co-Op Bank said in a statement, without giving financial details.

The deal remains subject to regulatory clearance.

In a separate statement, Co-Op Bank Chief Executive Nick Slape said the bank had made a pretax profit of around $10m in the three months to end-March, and the lender’s restructuring plan was ahead of schedule.

Slape, who was appointed CEO last year, added that he expects the bank to return to “sustainable profitability” from 2021.

“At the half-year we will have reached the midpoint of our turnaround strategy and we are ahead of where we expected to be,” Slape said.