Spaniards home in on Abbey

Spanish bank Santander Central Hispano today pledged to give up its two boardroom seats at Royal Bank of Scotland if it lands Abbey National.

SCH is also in the process of halving its stake in RBS to 2.54% as it moves to ensure its relationship with the Edinburgh-based bank does not cause its takeover to be mired by competition complaints from other UK banks. The sale of up to 79 million RBS shares could raise as much as £1.24bn (€1.8bn).