Starling and Barclays bid to buy Kensington
UK-based digital challenger bank Starling and Barclays are bidding against each other and other high-street lenders to buy mortgage platform Kensington.
Based in Maidenhead, Kensington has been described as one of the UK’s largest non-bank specialist mortgage lenders; they are also known for giving loans to the self-employed and the over-55s.
Headed by Mark Arnold, formerly an executive at General Electric’s (GE) financial division, Kensington is known as one of the largest issuers in the residential mortgage-backed securities market.
For the last seven years, Kensington has issued an estimated £12 billion worth of mortgages; their last annual revenue in 2019 was £58.85 million.
Last year, Kensington’s private equity owners, Blackstone and Sixth Street, put up the firm for sale after seven years in private equity ownership, according to Sky News.
Wall Street bank Morgan Stanley will be overseeing the auction of the business; reports say the bidding is likely to lead to two separate transactions culminating in a price of £1 billion.
In addition to Starling and Barclays, their rival investment houses Pimco and M&G Investments are also vying to buy Kensington’s mortgage assets.