Royal Bank of Scotland (LON:RBS) released its annual results on the Friday for the year ended 31 December 2018. Annual profit has more than doubled, driving the bank to reveal a special dividend. RBS also warned of the economic and political Brexit-induced uncertainty that lies ahead.

Pre-tax profit for the financial year was £1.62 billion, compared to the £752 million on-year figure.

Operating profit increased 50% to £3.36 billion.

Final ordinary dividend per share is 3.5p. Additionally, the bank has also announced a special dividend of 7.5p per share.

Chief Executive, Ross McEwan, commented on the results:

“2018 was a year of strong progress on our strategy – we settled our remaining major legacy issues, paid our first dividend in ten years and delivered another full year bottom line profit. However, while our financial performance is more assured, we know that a significant gap remains to achieving our ambition to be the best bank for customers. We are fully focused on closing this gap.”

“Today we are reporting a pre-tax operating profit of £3.4 billion and a bottom line attributable profit of £1.6 billion for 2018. In addition, we are pleased to propose a full year ordinary dividend of 3.5 pence per share, and a special dividend of 7.5 pence per share. These are in addition to the ordinary dividend we paid at our interim results. Together, we will have returned £1.6 billion to shareholders, and around £1 billion to the UK taxpayer in dividends. We also have shareholder approval to participate in a directed buyback should the government seek to dispose of a portion of its shares.”

RBS has emphasised the uncertain economic outlook that lies ahead of the UK’s planned departure date from the European Union.

In December, RBS applied for a German banking license amid concerns surrounding Brexit. The Chief Executive has warned of the economic and political Brexit uncertainties in the past, claiming it has the potential to lead to a recession.

“Our central economic forecast, which supports our corporate plan, is in line with consensus as at the end of December 2018 and shows average UK GDP growth of around 1.0-2.0% from 2019 to 2023 and continued low interest rates. Given the current uncertainties we will continue to actively monitor and react to market conditions,” the bank said.

The Chief Executive continued:

“The UK economy faces a heightened level of uncertainty related to the ongoing Brexit negotiations. We have continued to support our customers, providing £30.4 billion in gross new UK mortgage lending in 2018, and Commercial Banking made or renewed commitments of around £30 billion of term lending facilities to mainly UK businesses. Our Commercial and Business Banking businesses supported total lending of more than £100 billion in 2018.”

Last year, RBS paid its first dividend since it was rescued from collapse ten years ago.

At 09:25 GMT Friday, Royal Bank of Scotland Group plc (LON:RBS) shares were trading at +1.08%.