Britain's Lloyds to pay first dividend since financial crisis

LONDON, Feb 27 (Reuters) - Lloyds Banking Group has reported its first dividend since its bailout during the financial crisis of 2007 to 2009 at a cost of 20 billion pounds ($31 billion) to taxpayers.

The bank, which is now 24 percent-owned by the government, said it would pay a dividend of 0.75 pence for the 2014 financial year.

It reported an underlying profit of 7.8 billion pounds, up from 6.2 billion the year before and ahead of the market expectations for a profit of 7.5 billion pounds, based on the average forecast from 17 analysts polled by Reuters.

($1 = 0.6475 pounds) (Reporting by Matt Scuffham, editing by Sinead Cruise)