Lloyds Banking Group shares fell after the Government postponed the sale of its final stake in the lender.

The chairman of Lloyds Banking Group has said that there was no “compelling economic argument” for Britain to stay in the European Union without a significant change in its relationship with the bloc.

The UK Treasury yesterday announced its intention to sell at least £2bn worth of shares in Lloyds Banking Group to private retail investors in spring 2016 to return the bank to full private ownership.

Complaints about Britain’s financial firms rose 8% in the first half of this year after a jump in new cases about packaged bank accounts, the UK industry’s watchdog said yesterday.

Shareholders in Britain’s Lloyds Banking Group are calling on the government to rethink plans to sell down its stake in the lender to ensure taxpayers get the best deal.

Lloyds Banking Group set aside a further £1.4bn (€1.99bn) to compensate customers mis-sold loan insurance, pushing its first-half profit below analysts’ forecasts.

Britain will launch a sale of shares in Lloyds to private retail investors in the next 12 months in what is expected to be the biggest privatisation since Margaret Thatcher’s government sold off assets in the 1980s.

It will take another five years or more to make real inroads into the dominance of Britain’s five biggest banks, a senior Bank of England official said yesterday.

Dividend cheer for the 3m shareholders of Lloyds Banking Group and other strong corporate earnings spurred the Ftse to a new record yesterday.