Page 7 - RBS – ABN takeover

The Background

In early April 2007 Sir Fred suffered

his first big setback when he and his

counterparts at Fortis and Santander

flew in to Amsterdam for an arranged
Sir Fred Goodwin
meeting to discuss their intentions • Born 1958
• CEO RBS 2000
Sir Fred, a lawyer by training, an accountant by
with Rijkman Groenink, ABN's chief trade and a serial acquirer by nature joined RBS
in 1998 as deputy chief executive gaining the
executive. However, unbeknown to top job in 2000. Since then he has undertaken
23 acquisitions (2000-2006) and has now won
the world’s largest cross-border takeover battle
them, Groenink had flown to London for a Bank He has quadrupled the bank's assets
since 2000, while in 2006 pre-tax profits rose by
for a joint press conference with 16 per cent to £9.2 billion. RBS now ranks
among the world's top ten banks.
Barclays to announce a management - ABN Amro. Sir Fred is notoriously averse to
any sort of personal publicity.

–backed agreement to be acquired by

Barclays without cancelling the meeting with the RBS consortium.

Sir Fred and his partners immediately went on the offensive. With his team of 15

close advisers Sir Fred sought any weaknesses in Barclays armour. In the RBS

Charter One deal, RBS commented that it had spent 500 man-days -- the

equivalent of 100 people working for five days -- examining that bank's books.

However, the Barclays-ABN deal looked unbreakable. Not only had Barclays

unveiled a recommended all-share merger with ABN, but after the RBS

Consortium announced its intention to bid for ABN it wrong-footed everybody by