Investment fund TCI tried to spark a bidding war for Dutch group ABN Amro today, seizing on early merger talks by British bank Barclays with an invitation to other banks to make offers.
ABN Amro and British bank Barclays revealed overnight that they were in 'exclusive' talks to create a vast global bank.
A deal would create the second-biggest bank in Europe and Britain after HSBC.
British investment fund TCI, a leading shareholder in ABN Amro which wants to see the bank broken up, said it was 'encouraged' by the preliminary talks with Barclays.
However, it added that it hopes the talks with Barclays will not prevent the ABN Amro board from employing a process that considers bids by other institutions to produce the best result for shareholders.
Barclays said the talks were on 'a potential combination of the two organisations which will create value for both sets of shareholders'. The statement followed newspaper reports at the weekend.
A takeover by Barclays of ABN Amro would create a group worth more than €120 billion, making it the world's fifth-biggest behind Citigroup, Bank of America, China's ICBC and British rival HSBC.
