I think the board has done very much better than the otherbanks he said

"I think the board has done very much better than the otherbanks," he said. "I don't think existing shareholders were that keen ontaking shares last autumn, whereas the Middle Eastern investorswere," said small shareholder James Boston. Some voiced anger about November's fundraising, but mostsupported management for avoiding selling a stake to the UKgovernment, unlike rivals Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS.L) andLloyds Banking Group (LLOY.L). Over 1,000 shareholders attended the meeting, requiring thebank to use an overflow room. The bank's shares crashed to a 22-year low of 47.3 pence inJanuary, but have since soared as regulators said its capitalposition was adequate and it improved trading prompted a rethinkamong investors. "On current trading, to say Q1 was well ahead on last yearis a positive," Fox-Pitt, Kelton analyst Leigh Goodwin said. Barclays shares were down 0.5 percent at 217 pence by 1515GMT, in line with a slightly lower FTSE 100 share index .FTSE.

The new lending will beevenly divided between mortgage and business loans. Barclays also said it planned to increase lending to UKbusinesses and consumers by 11 billion pounds in 2009, anincrease of 6 percent on last year. Varley said 2009 will remain difficult and warned payouts toshareholders would be "significantly lower" than the 50 percentof profits typically handed over in recent years. HIGHER MARKET SHARE BarCap had benefitted from higher market share and volumeand improved spreads in rates, foreign exchange and commodities,Diamond said, but declined to provide specifics ahead of adetailed quarterly results due out on May 7. "I think we're past the worst, but we'll be in a period ofrecovery for 9 to 18 months," he told reporters after the AGM.

The financial industry was past the mid-point of the crisis,said Bob Diamond, president of the bank and head of investmentbank arm Barclays Capital. It cancelled itsfinal dividend for 2008 in order to conserve capital as theglobal banking crisis unfolded. The bank said it intends to resume paying dividends earlynext year, covering the final quarter of 2009. [ID:nLM494747] "In the first quarter of 2009 our financial performance iswell ahead of the prior year period, meaning that we've madegood profits, and generated equity as a result," Varley said. That backed up broadly positive quarterly results from U.S.and European peers, including Credit Suisse (CSGN.VX) whichposted a $1.7 billion net profit on Thursday, beatingexpectations. Barclays Chief Executive John Varley told investors thebank, which bought Lehman Brothers' U.S operations last year, had had a strong start to the year.

All other boardmembers were comfortably re-elected at the annual shareholdermeeting and 95 percent of investors approved the bank'sremuneration report. A sharp rally by Barclays shares in recent weeks took thesting out of the investor backlash, however. Agius acknowledged the fundraising has strained relationswith shareholders, and expressed "sincere regret" for lossesincurred by investors during the past year. Investors slammed Agius last November for a controversial 7billion pound ($10.19 billion) fundraising by the bank, whichsidestepped their traditional pre-emption rights and offeredmore favourable investment terms to two big Middle Eastinvestors.

Includingabstentions, the protest vote was just over 17 percent. Barclays said 16.3 percent of shareholders who voted wereagainst the re-election of Marcus Agius as chairman. His power numbers are ridiculous: 142 HR and 384 RBI coming into this season in basically two-and-a-half seasons He is the fastest player to 100 home runs in history He was Rookie of the Year in 2005 and MVP in 2006. In short, he has big-time box-office and trade value. The problem, unlike the other guys, is that he has holes in game.