The group chief executive of London-based Lloyds Banking Group Plc since 2003. Lloyds is one of the United Kingdom's largest banks. Daniels streamlined the company, selling its New Zealand and Brazil operations to improve profits. Along with then-chairman Sir Victor Blank, Daniels led the purchase of HBOS in 2008, which initially created multi-billion-dollar losses for Lloyd's. In the aftermath of the 2008 global financial crisis, Daniels was one of the few heads of a British financial company to keep his job. He waived his large bonuses for 2008 and 2009 under social and political pressure.
Born in 1951 in Montana, Daniels earned his undergraduate degree from Cornell. Upon earning his masters in management from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1975, he began his career with Citibank and, over the next two decades, worked in its Panama, Argentina, Chile and London divisions. In 1998 he went to Travelers Life & Annuity, a division of Citibank, as its chairman and CEO.