Barclays is one of the UK's largest banks. It  has a history that can be traced back 300 years. It owns the credit card business Barclaycard and has a strong investment banking arm in Barclays Capital to go with its high street retail presence.

It employs almost 150,000 people around the world. It emerged ahead of some it's major competetors in the financial crisis that arose out of the Lehman Brothers collapse, but took advantage of competitors weakness by buying a large part of the Lehmans business.

Barclays dividends:

It's dividends suffered horribly as a result of the crisis and it is just beginning to reinstate them in a small way. It has good dividend cover and growth of the dividend should be possible.

A return to the heady days of a 34p dividend are seemingly a long way off. With the current worries over Sovereign debt, investors must take great care with all of the banks.