{"id":127,"date":"2007-08-06T12:41:31","date_gmt":"2007-08-06T12:41:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.the-finance-zone.co.uk\/uncategorized\/the-ec-backs-barclays-bid-for-abn\/"},"modified":"2007-08-06T12:41:31","modified_gmt":"2007-08-06T12:41:31","slug":"the-ec-backs-barclays-bid-for-abn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/2007\/08\/06\/the-ec-backs-barclays-bid-for-abn\/","title":{"rendered":"The EC backs Barclays bid for ABN"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

The European Commission has given the green light to Barclays proposed takeover of Dutch bank ABN Amro, saying the deal posed no competition risks.<\/span><\/strong> <\/span><\/p>\n

The decision came as Barclays formally launched its 65bn euro ($89bn; \u00c2\u00a343.6bn) takeover bid for the group. <\/span><\/p>\n

Barclays is hoping its offer will beat a 71bn euro bid tabled by a consortium led by Royal Bank of Scotland. <\/span><\/p>\n

ABN Amro has refused to back either offer, in order to ensure “a level playing field” between the bidders. <\/span><\/p>\n

In a statement, the Commission said it had given Barclays the green light to buy ABN as the British bank was ” not active in retail and corporate banking” in the group’s domestic market. <\/span><\/p>\n

“ABN Amro’s activities in these markets in the UK are marginal,” it added. <\/span><\/p>\n

Rival plans<\/span><\/strong> <\/span><\/p>\n

The news comes as Fortis investors in Belgium voted overwhelmingly to back the Belgian-Dutch bank’s participation in the RBS-led bid. <\/span><\/p>\n

Dutch investors in the bank will vote on the decision later. <\/span><\/p>\n

Their backing is seen as pivotal to whether the RBS consortium will win out in the battle for ABN. <\/span><\/p>\n

At the meeting in Brussels, Fortis investors also backed plans for the bank to issue 13bn euros in shares to fund its part of the deal. <\/span><\/p>\n

The RBS-led group – which also involves Spanish bank Santander – sweetened its offer last month, upping its cash element from 71% to 93% in an effort to win over shareholders. <\/span><\/p>\n

Takeover battle<\/span><\/strong> <\/span><\/p>\n

A bidding war for ABN Amro broke out between the two UK group’s earlier this year. <\/span><\/p>\n

ABN had originally supported the Barclays offer, a stance which was viewed as a crucial factor in Barclays winning the fight against RBS, but withdrew its backing last month. <\/span><\/p>\n

Under Barclay’s current proposed cash and share offer, ABN investors will receive 13.15 euros in cash and 2.13 new Barclays shares for each ABN share. <\/span><\/p>\n

The offer period runs from 7 August to 4 October, Barclays said. <\/span><\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The European Commission has given the green light to Barclays proposed takeover of Dutch bank ABN Amro, saying the deal<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-127","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-banking"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=127"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=127"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=127"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-finance-zone.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=127"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}