Abbey rules
29/04/2008
The Abbey bank has trebled its share of the new mortgage market in the first three months of the year, thanks to the position of its Spanish parent company.
It said its market share was up to 15.9% in the first quarter of 2008, up from 4.9% in the same period of 2007.
The bank was able to benefit from the strong capital position of its parent company Santander.
Spain's largest bank posted a first quarter net profit, just ahead of forecasts, of 2.206bn euros (£1.73bn).
Abbey managed to avoid the difficulties of many of its rivals during the credit crunch because it relies on customer deposits for much of its lending.
