Williams & Glyn sale assessed by competition regulators

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-32915305

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The competition watchdog is to assess the impact of the relaunch of former Manchester bank Williams & Glyn on the UK banking sector.

The government has asked the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) to examine the implications for competition.

The brand disappeared from the High Street nearly 30 years ago after it was bought by Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS).

RBS has been ordered to sell it as part of a shake-up of the banking system.

It followed the 2008 government bailout of RBS, which left it 81%-owned by the government.

The Bank of England's Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) will also assess whether the bank has a viable and sustainable business model.

RBS agreed to sell 314 bank branches for £600m to the Corsair consortium in September 2013.

Improve competition

However, RBS is required to sell the business as a stand-alone public company by 2017.

It had originally agreed to sell the branches to Santander for about £1.65bn, but the deal collapsed.

Williams & Glyn's, as it was formerly known with an apostrophe, was a small business and retail bank, mainly based in the north of England.

Partly state-owned rival Lloyds was also forced to divest itself of a large number of branches, which have been rebranded as TSB, another revived banking name.

The government wants the sale of Williams & Glyn to improve competition in the industry.

The CMA will report its findings in July 2015, and the Treasury and RBS will then consider those findings.

The CMA said: "We have today received a request from the chancellor of the exchequer to advise on the implications for competition of the latest proposals for divestment by RBS of Williams & Glyn as a new UK retail bank.

"This work will be carried out separately from the ongoing banking market investigation and our advice will not prejudge the outcome of this investigation."