Lloyds swings back into profit The rising cost of the payment protection insurance mis-selling scandal has eaten into first-quarter profits at Lloyds Banking Group. The partly state-owned bank on Tuesday posted a pre-tax profit of £288m for the first three months of 2012, which compared with a £3.47bn loss in the same period a year earlier. IN Banks Lloyds was hampered by an extra £375m charge to cover the cost of compensating customers for mis-sold PPI, a form of loan cover that was once a big earner for banks. It had already set aside £3.2bn for the purpose last year. However, it said the increase was necessary due to the increased volume of complaints. Barclays, the rival UK bank, also took a further PPI charge of £300m last week when it announced its own first-quarter results.