Deutsche Bank withdraws from the race for RBS Romania

According to the latest data, the sale of RBS Romania, former ABN Amro Romania, is coordinated by the Swiss UBS investment bank. This was not Deutsche Bank’s first attempt to take over a major lender on the Romanian market. The financial institution was an also-ran in the race for the privatization of Banca Comercială Română (BCR), but did not reach the final stage. Following losses worth tens of billions of euro, the RBS group decided to forego the operations it had on 15 markets, including in Romania. RBS Romania has assets worth over €2.2 billion. The current RBS Bank Romania abandoned its process for turning this into a branch, and continues to be a subsidiary, still complying with the rules and regulations imposed by the National Bank of Romania (BNR).

RBS took over the Dutch ABN Amro bank in 2007, together with the Spanish Santander bank, and the Belgian-Dutch Fortis group, in a record-transaction for the banking sector - some €70 billion. Due to the global economic crisis, RBS posted record losses in 2008, worth $34.4 bln, and the British government was forced to intervene to help the lender. As of March 2009, RBS Romania is offering brokerage services to its clients directly in the name of the RBS Bank (Romania) S.A., rather than through a dedicated vehicle - RBS Securities (Romania) S.A.