RBS Said to Sell ABS to Bolster Capital Before ECB Plan
Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc offloaded 9 billion euros ($11 billion) of bonds, mostly asset-backed securities, to reduce the amount of capital it’s required to hold, according to a person with knowledge of the matter.
Britain’s largest state-owned lender said in a trading update today that it “took advantage of improved market prices” to sell the debt securities for about 200 million pounds ($324 million) less than they were valued on its own accounts, without giving details. Most of the bonds were ABS held at RBS’s Dutch entity, said the person who asked not to be identified because the matter is private.
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