Santander in Pole Position
08 / Mar / 2010
Santander has moved into pole position to take over the 320 branches in England being sold by Royal Bank of Scotland. A large corporate buyer with existing UK interests such as the Spanish bank would frustrate attempts to inject fresh competition into British banking. The sale memorandum went out last week, but it emerged over the weekend that any buyer would have to find an extra £3 billion as well as the mooted price of £1 billion. The business, which is being marketed as the old Williams & Glyn’s branch network, is dependent on £3 billion of emergency funding from the Bank of England, part of the rescue package provided to RBS and the rest of the banking sector. A buyer would have to replace this with fresh funding within weeks. More trouble for Labour, Alistair Darling is at loggerheads with business leaders because of his perceived “leisurely” approach to the final Budget before the election. The Treasury has pledged to halve Britain’s £178 billion deficit by 2014, but the CBI said that the Chancellor had failed to provide sufficient detail about a credible repayment schedule.