In a recent move, the Bank of England has gone on to give its nod for the UBS Group AG’s takeover of the troubled Credit Suisse Group AG in United Kingdom, people familiar with the process have gone on to confirm Reuters. Apparently, the UK happens to be a major market for the Swiss lenders, who are racing to close the rescue deal.
Although it has not yet been established if there are any conditions attached to the approval, which apparently comes less than three weeks after the takeover was made public, and goes on to show the urgency surrounding the transaction.
It is well to be noted that the change of control approvals can essentially take up to 60 working days to get secured in Britain. On March 19, just after the deal was struck, the Bank of England had said in a statement that it welcomed the overall set of actions put in place by the Swiss authorities so as to support financial stability.
UBS mandates 58 countries to ink the combination that will make Switzerland’s biggest bank a wealth management giant with access of $3 trillion when it comes to assets. The longer the agreement takes to close, the tougher it is going to be for Credit Suisse to keep its business under control.
The United Kingdom, where Credit Suisse has somewhere around $60 billion of risk-weighted assets, mostly in its investment banking division, happens to be the biggest market outside of Switzerland.
UBS too has received a temporary go-ahead from European Union antitrust regulators so as to accomplish the acquisition of Credit Suisse, however, will still have to get clearance when it comes to EU merger rules, says the European Commission.
Ralph Hamers, the UBS CEO who is going to step down on April 5, post the annual shareholders meeting, said that plans can only be partially developed because Credit Suisse is still a different company. He added that it is therefore very important that they receive regulators support across the world, and that too as soon as possible.
Notably, the chief secretary to the UK Treasury, John Glen, had said that he did not have any immediate issues when it comes to the implementation of Credit Suisse’s rescue by UBS.