RBS - No Interest In Bank's Share Offer

[Paule]

The Government will own 57.9% of the Royal Bank of Scotland after the lender's £15bn share issue flopped.

The bank's existing shareholders refused to buy the new stock because RBS's shares were trading below the 65.5p offer price announced in October.

They took up just 0.24%, leaving the public to foot the bill for the remainder.

It will leave taxpayers with a paper loss of almost £3bn.

The RBS share sale is part of the Government's £37bn bail-out of banks.

It will receive a total of £20bn, made up of £15bn in ordinary shares and £5bn in preference shares.

The latter come with special conditions including a ban on dividends until RBS buys them back.

In August RBS unveiled its first loss in 40 years as a public company.

After writedowns of £5.9bn it reported statutory pre-tax losses of £692m for the first half of 2008.

The Treasury is also pumping £17bn into Lloyds TSB and Halifax Bank of Scotland, which are in the process of merging.

Government Will Own 57.9 Percent Of Royal Bank Of Scotland After Share Issue Flopped | Business | Sky News

[ROBSTER]

Re: RBS - No Interest In Bank's Share Offer

On A Similar thread:

NEWS RELEASE FROM BOB EGERTON, BANK CHARGES CAMPAIGNER

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

BANK CHARGES CAMPAIGNER CALLS ON STATE-OWNED RBS/NATWEST TO PULL OUT OF BANK CHARGES TEST CASE

Bank charges campaigner, Bob Egerton, has called on the government to intervene in the long-running saga of the bank charges test case and to instruct RBS/Natwest to withdraw its appeal against the High Court ruling on the unfairness of penalty charges. The so-called test case was launched by the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) in July 2007 and has crawled at a snail's pace through the court system. The Court of Appeal heard an appeal from 8 of Britain's high street banks in early November and it will probably be several months before a judgment is announced. Even then, there could be a further appeal to the House of Lords. Meanwhile, a further hearing is scheduled in the High Court for 9 December to consider other issues that were not covered in the first batch of hearings.


Bob Egerton says, "The government's rhetoric about putting the banks' feet to the fire is just that – empty rhetoric. With the government now having acquired a majority stake in Royal Bank of Scotland Group, it is in a position to take direct action to help the millions of bank customers who have been mercilessly exploited for years by Britain's high street banks imposing draconian penalty charges on their accounts. The government should instruct RBS to withdraw from the court proceedings, to sit down with the OFT and work out a fair charging regime not just for consumers but also for small businesses, and to make fair settlements of the tens of thousands of claims caught in the logjam of the courts system. This could be an exemplar for the other banks who will then have to follow suit or face humiliation in the courts. If the government does not intervene, we will have the farce of the taxpayer funding one set of highly paid lawyers representing the OFT to fight a continuing court battle against another set of highly paid lawyers representing RBS also being funded by us the taxpayer. The government has, to date, talked loudly about the banks. Now is the time to talk softly, but to use the big stick that it carries."



ENDS


Editor's note:
The test case was launched in July 2007. It concerns whether or not the penalty charge regimes that banks have in their terms and conditions with personal account holders can be assessed for fairness under the provisions of The Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999. The first High Court hearing was held in January 2008 to consider just the banks' most recent terms and conditions. Judgment was delivered in April 2008 in which the judge said that the terms could be assessed for fairness. The banks appealed this decision and the appeal was heard in early November. A decision is awaited on that. Meanwhile, in October the high court judge delivered his verdict on the banks' historical terms and conditions and came to the same conclusion as on the current terms. But a few issues were left undecided and a further hearing on those will be held on 9 December.
The test case, in theory, only concerns personal account customers because business account customers are not covered by the UTCCRs. However, the banks did throw into the test case the issue of common law penalties which are applicable in business accounts. This means that the banks may try to use the test case judgment (which was broadly favourable to the banks on the issue of common law penalties) to block business account claims.


News release issued by Bob Egerton


Bob the Bankbuster

[natweststaffmember]

Re: RBS - No Interest In Bank's Share Offer

**** OFF bob. You can quote me by the way(I WILL BE BACK TO THIS VERY SHORTLY)

[trusco]

Re: RBS - No Interest In Bank's Share Offer

If the government had any balls they would start knocking out low fixed rate mortgages & loans through its bank The Northern rock and watch the competition follow suit rather than begging the banks to lower their rates.

Problem is that would make the Northern Rock successful and that would never do ! The tax payer making a return!

Instead the rock is the biggest culprit in foreclosing ...thats the lead the banks need isn't it Gordon ?

Problem is Bob the banks pretty much run their own show and there is little we, or the government will (or can) do about it short of disbanding the old boys network we know as the FSA and powering up OFT to keep a hand on the reigns.

Full marks for having a go though Bob. Keep chipping away and you will make a difference.

You need a bit more support from the likes of this site and others .

What d'you think Natty?

[natweststaffmember]

Re: RBS - No Interest In Bank's Share Offer

The taxpayer is making 12% or approximately £150,000(that was simply taking my figure of £5billion) a day in interest. No dividend is being paid(so no taxpayer benefit) and the preference share was at 65.5p when the RBS Group share price was hovering around the 50p mark. I knew at the beginning it was a bad deal for RBS and posted here those very same reasons. I don't think that HMT wanted a majority shareholding but when the option price was announced and RBS shares went as low as 40p, there was no way the government would not end up with a lot of em. Until the share price goes up to 65.5p and above, HMT will continue to own a majority share in RBS Group. As of Monday the additional shares hit the market. Nice rhetoric Bob, but HMT will not be medalling with legal matters of the RBS Group. They don't want to be a majority shareholder in spite of what you may think.