Annual Report 2020
Our strategy is working and we are confident Barclays is in a strong position for the challenges and opportunities ahead.
Investing in Barclays
Barclays is a British universal bank. We support consumers and small businesses through our retail banking services, and larger businesses and institutions through our corporate and investment banking services.
Since the early days of the pandemic last year, our diversified business has demonstrated the resilience critical to ensuring Barclays’ financial integrity. It gives us the capacity to step up for our customers, clients, colleagues and communities when they need our support the most, and deliver for our shareholders by staying profitable in every quarter.
Group CEO
Our investment case
Resilience through diversification
We are a British universal bank diversified by business, geography and income type, serving consumers and wholesale customers and clients globally. This diversification provides resilience through different economic cycles.
- Scale retail and business bank in the UK.
- Top tier global corporate and investment bank.
- Broad international consumer lending, cards, and payments franchise, and private bank.
Growth opportunities
Our diversified model offers us growth opportunities. We intend to grow Barclays by continuing to invest in our core business strengths, and delivering world-class technology and digital capabilities to our customers and clients.
- Attractive growth opportunities in markets where we have established businesses today.
- Investing in less capital intensive, technology-led, annuity businesses.
- Opening up potential new income streams and improving cost efficiencies.
Sustainable impact
We understand that our success is judged not only by commercial performance, but also by how we act sustainably and responsibly for each other and the long term. We are agents of change.
- Our ambition to be a net zero bank by 2050 and a commitment to align all our financing activities with the goals of the Paris Climate Agreement.
- Tackling climate change by accelerating the transition to a low-carbon economy.
Strong balance sheet supporting returns
A strong capital base, high levels of liquidity, and diversified profit streams provide a solid foundation for attractive and sustainable return of capital to shareholders. Barclays aims to achieve the following targets:
- Group returns: return on tangible equity (RoTE) of >10% over time.
- Cost efficiency: cost: income ratio of <60% over time.
- Capital strength: Common Equity Tier 1 (CET1) ratio in the range of 13-14%.
How we're performing - Q1 2021 highlights
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Our ESG approach
We believe that comprehensive, robust and comparable disclosures are essential to enabling stakeholders to understand our activity and progress.
Leadership
An overview of our Board and Executive Committee.
Purpose and Values
Our success as a bank cannot be separated from our culture. And the power of who we are is greatest when we are bound together by a common Purpose and shared Values.