Fortis acquired the following business units of ABN AMRO (the acquired ABN AMRO businesses):
- the ABN AMRO Business Unit Netherlands (excluding former Dutch wholesale clients, Interbank and DMC Consumer Finance)
- the ABN AMRO Private Clients Business Unit (excluding Latin America)
- the ABN AMRO Asset Management Business Unit
- a part of the shared assets, equal to Fortis’ share in the entire acquisition of ABN AMRO, and
- the ABN AMRO brand name.
The activities of the business units can be described as follows:
Business Unit Netherlands (excluding former Dutch wholesale clients, Interbank and DMC Consumer Finance)
The ABN AMRO Business Unit Netherlands serves consumer and commercial banking clients in The Netherlands. This Business Unit has a staff of approximately 21,000 people operating through a network of 561 bankshops, 65 advisory branches, three dedicated mid-market corporate client units, 2 large corporate client wholesale centres and 4 integrated call centres. Business Unit Netherlands also operates approximately 1,600 ATMs and internet and mobile channels and is active in the intermediary market.
Business Unit Private Clients
The Business Unit Private Clients provides private banking services to wealthy individuals and institutions with EUR 1 million or more in net assets to invest. In 2006, it employed a staff of approximately 3,300 people, operating through 103 offices in 23 countries.
Business Unit Asset Management
The Business Unit Asset Management provides asset management services directly to institutional clients (such as central banks, pension funds, insurance companies and leading charities) and to private investors through ABN AMRO’s consumer and private banking arms and through third-party distributors such as insurance companies and other banks. It employs approximately 1,500 staff and operates in 26 countries worldwide.
Fortis received approval from the European Commission for the acquisition of ABN AMRO. As part of the approval, the Commission has imposed some conditions on Fortis to address certain competition concerns in the Commercial Banking segment in the Netherlands. The ‘remedies’ requested by the Commission consist of a post-acquisition divestment package relating to specified parts of the Business Unit Netherlands of ABN AMRO. A key element is the proposed sale of Hollandsche Bank Unie N.V. (an independent and separately licensed commercial bank), 13 advisory branches and 2 Corporate Client Departments and the sale of the Dutch factoring company IFN Finance B.V.
The scope of these divestments represents around 10% in terms of assets, income and initially projected revenue and cost synergies of the part of Business Unit Netherlands acquired by Fortis.
