![\"Lloyds](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/a690616ce6740e542f3bcf1826e4668b.jpeg\")
Lloyds upgraded by Citi as Iran war expected to support bank sector earnings Proactive uses images sourced from Shutterstock <\/p>\n Lloyds upgraded by Citi as Iran war expected to support bank sector earnings Proactive uses images sourced from Shutterstock <\/p>\n
Lloyds Banking Group PLC (LSE:LLOY)<\/a>\u00a0has been upgraded by Citigroup as the US bank’s analysts see European lenders as likely to benefit from a stronger outlook for interest rates due to the ongoing economic shockwaves from the Iran war.<\/p>\n Events in Iran have shifted the market’s rate expectations, with the forward curve now implying two interest rate rises from the European Central Bank this year. Higher rates tend to support bank profitability by widening the margin between what lenders earn on loans and pay on deposits.<\/p>\n The analysts said European banks remain “one of the few sectors” still seeing upgrades to earnings forecasts. This has been driven by resilient revenues and, in some cases, better cost guidance from management teams.<\/p>\n The potential for further efficiency gains is also seen, with banks expected to adopt artificial intelligence tools over the next three years to improve productivity and reduce costs.<\/p>\n At the same time, lenders are generating surplus capital. This can be returned to shareholders through share buybacks, or used to fund lending growth and acquisitions.<\/p>\n While Lloyds was upgraded, it\u00a0is not yet one of Citi\u2019s top picks in the sector, which are HSBC Holdings PLC (LSE:HSBA)<\/a>, HSBC Holdings PLC (LSE:HSBA)<\/a>\u00a0and France’s Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 G\u00e9n\u00e9rale.<\/p>\n Shares in the black-horse bank were down 2.1% to\u00a099.95p on Thursday, as its shares went ex-dividend.<\/p>\n Citi also upgraded Deutsche Bank to ‘neutral\/high risk’ as part of the same note.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lloyds upgraded by Citi as Iran war expected to support bank sector earnings Proactive uses images sourced from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":59301,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[22878,22880,10652,6441,22881,34,196,3492,22879,22067],"class_list":{"0":"post-59300","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-iran","8":"tag-citi","9":"tag-earnings-forecasts","10":"tag-european-central-bank","11":"tag-hsbc-holdings-plc","12":"tag-interest-rate-rises","13":"tag-iran","14":"tag-iran-war","15":"tag-lloyds","16":"tag-lloyds-banking-group","17":"tag-sector"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116374442070655807","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59300","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=59300"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59300\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/59301"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59300"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=59300"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=59300"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}