The British state will own 58% of RBS

The British government will hold a 58% stake of the stock of the "Royal Bank of Scotland" Plc group (RBS), which took over part of "ABN Amro" in 2007, the bank announced on Friday. According to company officials, the situation is due to the fact that the current RBS investors have only acquired 0,2% of the new shares offered by the bank in the context of the share capital increase.

This month, RBS shareholders have approved the plan to increase the bank"s share capital by 20 billion pounds (25 billion Euros). According to the plan, the London government will inject 5 billion pounds directly into RBS, in exchange for preferred stock. Moreover, the bank has planned to raise another 15 billion pounds from the market, through a share issue taken up by the British government.

The Government has announced that it would acquire the shares which are not taken up by investors.

RBS has specified that the current shareholders have only taken up 56 million of the issued shares, leaving the London Government to take up the remaining 22,8 billion shares.

"As a result, the British treasury will hold approximately 58% of RBS"s share capital", the banking group announced.

"We regret that existing shareholders did not purchase stock, but we understand the current market sentiment", stated chief executive of RBS, Stephen Hester.

RBS shares are trading below the below the share issue offer price of 65,5 pence a share, which subdued investors" interest to participate in the share capital increase.

Prior to the financial crisis, RBS was Britain"s largest second bank, with HSBC holding the top spot, but it has currently dropped to the fifth position. Besides rescuing RBS, the British government pledged to guarantee the share capital increases of "Lloyds TSB" and HBOS, banks which are about to merge. Thus, the British government will recapitalize RBS, HBOS and "Lloyds TSB" with up to 37 billion pounds (46,6 billion Euros), as part of the plan to rescue the banking sector.

In Romania, "ABN Amro" became RBS Romania starting with October 15th.