Metro Bank

Is Metro Bank safe?

For deposits up to £120,000, yes. Metro Bank PLC is a UK-authorised bank covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme, and in June 2026 it held more than twice the liquid assets the rules require. Above that limit the picture is weaker. Fitch rates Metro BB, below investment grade, and the bank has survived two capital scares in five years and paid regulators about £32 million in fines. We score it 58/100, well below Starling and Monzo at 70.

How Metro protects your deposits

All personal and business accounts sit with one legal entity, Metro Bank PLC, owned by the listed Metro Bank Holdings PLC.

What you hold	Covered?
Current, savings and fixed-term accounts	FSCSDeposit insuranceA government-backed scheme that repays bank customers up to a set limit if their bank fails, such as the FDIC in the US or the FSCS in the UK.More in the glossary, £120,000 per person in total
Joint account	£120,000 per holder
Temporary high balances (house sale, inheritance)	Up to £1.4 million for six months, under FSCS rules
Small business deposits	FSCS, £120,000 per eligible business

The FSCS limit rose from £85,000 to £120,000 in December 2025. If you hold more than that, splitting money across unrelated banking groups is the simple fix.

The 2019 and 2023 scares

Metro opened in 2010 as the first new high street bank in Britain for more than a century. Its first crisis came in January 2019, when it disclosed that it had applied the wrong risk weights to some commercial loans secured on property, so its capital was weaker than reported. Shares fell sharply, and the regulators later fined it.

The second came in autumn 2023. In September the PRA refused to let Metro use its own models to calculate mortgage risk weights, a change that would have cut how much capital it needed. Metro also had a £350 million bond to refinance by October 2024. On 5 October its shares fell by more than 30% in a day, and Fitch put its rating on watch for a downgrade, saying capital was tight. Three days later Metro agreed a £925 million package: £150 million of new shares, £175 million of new bail-in debt and £600 million of refinanced debt. Some bondholders took a loss, and Spaldy Investments, controlled by the Gilinski family, ended up with about 53% of the bank.

No taxpayer money was used and no depositor lost anything. But a bank that needs emergency funding twice in five years earns a low stability score.

Capital and funding today

Measure (30 June 2026)	Metro Bank
CET1 ratioCET1 ratioA bank's highest-quality capital (mainly shares and retained profits) as a share of its risk-weighted assets. Higher means more room to absorb losses.More in the glossary	12.3%
CET1 requirement incl. buffers	9.7%
Total capital plus MREL	25.3%
Leverage ratioLeverage ratioA bank's Tier 1 capital divided by its total exposures, without adjusting for risk. It is a simple backstop to risk-based capital rules.More in the glossary	7.4%
Liquidity coverage ratioLiquidity coverage ratioA bank's cash and easy-to-sell assets compared with the money that could flow out in a 30-day crisis. It must be at least 100%.More in the glossary	270%
Loan-to-deposit ratio	69%
Fitch rating	BB, positive

The numbers are steadier than in 2023. Metro reported a record underlying profit of about £61 million for the first half of 2026. Since January 2026 the Bank of England has classed it as a "transfer firm" for resolution, so its MREL requirement is now just its capital requirement and it no longer needs to keep issuing expensive bail-in bonds. In a failure, the authorities would aim to transfer its accounts to another bank rather than bail in creditors.

The CET1 buffer of 2.6 points is reasonable but slipping as Metro grows commercial and specialist lending, which carries higher risk weights. Fitch's BB rating is the main reason we score capital at 50, against 70 for Monzo and 72 for Starling.

Fines and financial crime

Date	Regulator	Fine	Why
December 2021	PRA	£5.4m	Weak governance of regulatory capital reporting, 2016–2019
December 2022	FCA	£10.0m	Published incorrect capital information to investors
November 2024	FCA	£16.7m	60 million transactions worth £51bn not checked for money laundering, 2016–2020

The 2024 case was a data error: transactions made on the day an account was opened, and until the record updated, never reached the monitoring system. Junior staff raised concerns in 2017 and 2018 that were not acted on. The FCA said Metro fixed the feed in 2019 but had no consistent check until December 2020.

How to bank safely with Metro

• Keep your total at Metro Bank PLC under £120,000 per person; for a business, count all its accounts together.
• If you are selling a house, the FSCSDeposit insuranceA government-backed scheme that repays bank customers up to a set limit if their bank fails, such as the FDIC in the US or the FSCS in the UK.More in the glossary protects qualifying temporary high balances up to £1.4 million for six months without any claim from you; move the money on once you can.
• Never move money to a "safe account" at a caller's request. Metro, like every UK bank, will never ask you to.

How we scored it

Liquidity (80) and deposit protectionDeposit insuranceA government-backed scheme that repays bank customers up to a set limit if their bank fails, such as the FDIC in the US or the FSCS in the UK.More in the glossary (78) are Metro's strongest factors: full FSCS cover and far more liquid assets than required. Stability (30) and conduct (35) are the weakest, for two capital crises and three fines in four years. Capital (50) is held back by Fitch's sub-investment-grade rating. Metro sits level with N26 and below NatWest at 68.