Barclays Capital, the investment banking arm of Barclays, maintained robust growth levels in the third quarter, bolstering expectations that the UK group's full-year profits will close up a third on last year to reach almost £7bn (€10.3bn).

Barclays said today in a third-quarter trading update to the stock exchange that "excellent growth in income and profit at Barclays Capital was broadly spread across products and geographies".