16th Dec 2015 07:20
LONDON (Alliance News) - Royal Bank of Scotland Group PLC on Wednesday confirmed it is now planning a trade sale of the Williams & Glyn retail banking business it is carving out from the rest of its operations, although preparations for an exit by initial public offering are continuing.
The decision to go with a trade sale follows a number of "informal approaches" for Williams & Glyn, according to RBS, which wants to sign a binding deal to sell the business by the end of 2016. The approaches had been reported by Bloomberg on Monday.
RBS must divest the Williams & Glyn retail banking network by the end of 2017, under European conditions as part of the banking group's GBP45.5 billion government rescue in the financial crisis of 2008-09.
However, RBS is now looking to separate the Williams & Glyn business from the rest of the group later than expected.
The separation has been pushed back to the first quarter of 2017, from the previous target of summer of 2016 and an IPO by the end of that year. RBS emphasised that the new target is still in line with meeting European conditions to dispose of the business before the end of 2017.
"Separating out the Williams & Glyn business is a complex process, but we remain focused on meeting our state aid obligation, achieving full divestment by the end of 2017, and reaching the best outcome for shareholders, customers, and staff
Williams & Glyn had net loans and advances to customers of GBP20.0 billion and customer deposits of GBP24.0 billion at the end of September.
By Samuel Agini; [email protected]; @samuelagini
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