Barclays reported a £1.2 billion  attributable first half loss yesterday after taking a £2.5 billion hit from the sale of its Africa business and calling an end to its restructuring.

The British bank said it had made a £1.4 billion loss on the sale of 33 per cent of Barclays Africa Group and took a further £1.1 billion impairment charge on the sale.

Barclays in June cut its stake in Barclays Africa Group to 15 per cent, ending more than 90 years as a major presence in the continent as it shifts its focus back to Britain and the US.

The losses from the sale of unwanted assets, which include the Africa business, showed the costs of the bank’s restructuring under Chief Executive Jes Staley, who has championed Barclays’ investment banking business as a means of boosting revenues.

The bank completed the run-down of its non-core division of other assets earmarked for sale to below its goal of £25 billion worth of assets, meaning the remainder can be folded back in to Barclays.

“Accomplishing both of these milestones marks an end to the restructuring of the Barclays Group, and brings forward the date when our shareholders can benefit from the full earnings power of this business,” Staley said in a statement.

Staley announced a new long-term goal for Barclays of a greater than 10 per cent return on equity, without giving a timetable for reaching that.

The bank’s return on equity excluding the Africa loss and conduct charges was eight per cent at the end of the first half.

The sale of the Africa unit boosted the bank’s core capital ratio, a key measure of financial strength and a source of concern for Barclays in recent years, to 13.1 per cent.

Barclays posted a half-year profit before tax of £2.3 billion compared with £2 billion for the same period a year ago, before the impact of the Africa sale was included.

That was worse than the £2.7 billion average estimate of analysts’ forecasts compiled by the bank.