Nationwide Building Society annual profits rise 9 percent

LONDON, May 24 (Reuters) - Nationwide Building Society (LSE: CCDS.L - news) , Britain's biggest customer-owned lender, reported a 9 percent increase in annual underlying profit to 1.3 billion pounds ($1.9 billion) on Tuesday.

Nationwide (LSE: NBS.L - news) , which is Britain's second biggest provider of home loans, said net mortgage lending for the year ended April 4 grew to 9.1 billion pounds in 2015, up 28 percent on the previous financial year.

Nationwide's key capital ratio rose to 23.2 percent, the highest level among major UK lenders, from 19.8 percent a year ago.

($1 = 0.6898 pounds) (Reporting by Lawrence White and Andrew MacAskill; Editing by Mark Potter)