One of Spain’s leading retail banking providers, BancoSabadell has announced that it will move ahead and acquire British bank, TSBfor approximately £1.7 (2.5) billion after Lloyds Banking Group agreed to sellits stake in the bank. In addition to selling its stake, Lloyds will pay £450($664) million to support the migration of the TSB’s IT infrastructure whichbased on Lloyds existing infrastructure to Banco Sabadell’s proprietary Proteoplatform.
Commenting on the announcement, Josep Oliu Creus, chairmanof Sabadell said, “We believe that our experience of growing SME lending, ourresilient and tested IT platform and our commitment to innovation will speed upTSB’s expansion so that it fulfils its potential as a strong and effectivechallenger to the traditional UK banks, without any of their legacy issues.”
With the move, Banco Sabadell gains a new outpost as thisrepresents the bank’s first move outside of Spain. With increased competitionin the UK retail banking environment, Banco Sabadell must see the opportunityto add significant volumes of new consumers in a highly developed market thatcould help propel the bank’s growth in other markets in the years ahead.
Overview by Tristan Hugo-Webb, Associate Director, Global Payments for Mercator Advisory Group
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