Virgin Money applies to become a bank

Commenting on news Virgin Money has applied to the Financial Services Authority for a licence to become a bank, Kevin Mountford, head of banking at moneysupermarket.com, said; "Although this news has been long expected, it will be interesting to see if and when it comes to fruition.

"The UK banking landscape is going to look very different in 2010; on one hand we will see consolidation with the likes of Alliance & Leicester and Abbey migrating to Santander but with Tesco and now Virgin declaring their ambitions it should lay down a real challenge to the traditional players. Hopefully this spells good news as it can only help to provide the UK consumer with a wider level of customer choice."