Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) is on the verge of striking a GBP200 million deal to sell Asian commercial and retail banking operations to its UK-based counterpart, Standard Chartered – reported Guardian.
Last month, RBS had sold its operations in Indonesia, Hong Kong and Taiwan for GBP325 million to Australia and New Zealand Banking Group. Now, it wants to sell the operations in India, China and Malaysia.
Analysts are of the opinion that the sale of RBS’ Asian assets will consolidate the position of boardmembers who are pitching for a possible rights issue to mimimise the bank’s dependence on the government. Analysts, who until recently thought that RBS’ balance sheet is vulnerable to economic uncertainity, now believe that as the economy slowly comes out of the clutches of the financial crisis, RBS can fancy its chances of less dependency on the government, reported the newspaper.
