The Lion Finance (LSE:BGEO) share value has surged once more, making it the FTSE 250‘s biggest riser on Wednesday (25 February). At £110.40 per share, the banking stock’s up 7% on the day.
Shareholders have turn into used to this type of beautiful efficiency. The inventory previously often known as Financial institution of Georgia has rocketed greater than 1,000% in worth over the past 5 years.
That’s a shocking outcome by any measure. However to place it into additional context, Lloyds‘ share value has risen 165% over the interval. Barclays and NatWest in the meantime have risen 191% and 206%, respectively.
The query is, might Lion Finance be the perfect banking share on London’s inventory market?
Picture supply: Getty Pictures
Income leap
It rocketed once more right this moment after releasing forecast-beating buying and selling numbers for final 12 months.
In 2025, the agency — which gives banking providers in Georgia and Armenia — noticed web curiosity earnings leaping 26% to GEL3bn. Sturdy financial progress in these rising markets drove buyer loans and deposits 20% and 17% larger, respectively.
As a consequence, underlying income surged 28% 12 months on 12 months, to GEL2.2m. Lion mentioned its backside line was “driven by strong loan book expansion, customer franchise growth, and sustained profitability across all core business divisions.”
Share buybacks
Like all of the FTSE 100‘s main banks, Lion Finance has sturdy monetary foundations. And on the finish of 2025 its Frequent Fairness Tier 1 (CET1) capital ratio was 17.6%.
This offers it monumental monetary firepower to take a position for progress. However that’s not all. It additionally gives scope for the financial institution to pay giant and rising dividends and launch sizeable share buybacks.
Lion hiked the full-year dividend 16.7% for 2025, and right this moment introduced the repurchase of one other GEL53.5m price of shares, taking the full for final 12 months to GEL203m.
This tallies up with the financial institution’s objective of returning 30% to 50% of annual income to shareholders, and gave the share value an additional increase.
Is Lion Finance the perfect financial institution?
Opinions will differ as as to if that is the UK’s greatest banking inventory and the concept of ‘the best’ is, after all, subjective. However I believe a case will be made for it. I personally actually want it to UK-focused banks like Lloyds. That’s because of its far superior progress prospects and due to this fact capability for sustained share value outperformance.
That’s to not say there aren’t potential challenges right here. Political distinction in Georgia between pro-Russia and EU-aligned political forces creates coverage uncertainty. They usually’re unlikely to be resolved any time quickly. The ultimate final result might have critical penalties for Georgia’s financial system and by extension Lion’s income.
However might this be baked into the present cheapness of the financial institution’s shares? I believe so, with its price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of seven.7 instances far decrease than any of those FTSE 100 banks.
On steadiness, I believe it’s a prime FTSE 250 share to think about proper now. Nevertheless it’s not the one prime progress inventory that’s grabbed my eye.
