27 July 2012 6:52am

Lloyds Banking Group may have sold more than half its substantial troubled loan portfolio in Australia but the UK bank may continue to rack up losses in this country.

The bank did not spell out its loss, assuming it was a loss, in Australia in the half year to June 2012 in its periodic disclosure released last night. The whole of the bank's international business (which includes Ireland as well as Australia) incurred an underlying loss of £1.34 billion for the half.

Lloyds said it took a bad debt charge of £203 million in Australia in the June 2012 half, down from £448 million...