Bank of Ireland said on 11 May that it swung to a pretax loss for the first quarter of 2020 on the back of impairment charges reflecting the deteriorating economic environment due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The Irish lender said the economic outlook for its core markets in Ireland and the UK has weakened. Lower business activity is expected to hurt lending volumes, which could halve compared with 2019 levels, while net interest margin is expected to decline in line with lower interest rates, the bank said.