Lloyds Sheds More Bad Property Loans

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Britain's Lloyds Banking Group has sold a portfolio of Irish home loans for £257 million ($419.4 million) to U.S. private equity firm Apollo, as the bank continues to shed bad property deals. 

Lloyds, which is one-third owned by the U.K. government, has lost billions of pounds in Ireland after the financial crisis and has been working on cutting non-core assets from its portfolio. The non-performing loans in the deal had a nominal value of £610 million and were sold at a 58 percent discount of that, Reuters reports. 

Earlier this year, Lloyds sold a £325 million ($498.8 million) portfolio of underperforming U.K. commercial property loans to U.S. private equity group Cerberus.

Tanager Limited, an entity affiliated with Apollo Global Management, purchased the latest loan portfolio. The portfolio lost £33 million last year, the bank said. Existing provisions taken against the assets wold prevent the deal from having a material impact on the bank.

The deal is due for completion in the first half on 2014.