Commerzbank and Dresdner in advanced talks for merger
Güncelleme Tarihi:
Commerzbank and Dresdner Bank are in advanced talks about a merger that would tie together two of Germany's biggest banks, a source from Commerzbank's supervisory board said on Friday.
Germany has been in the grip of frenzied merger speculation for weeks with a string of banks looking for a bidder or a merger partner.
Dresdner's parent Allianz wants to sell it to Commerzbank. Meanwhile, the country's biggest retail lender, Deutsche Postbank, is up for sale. Citigroup, too, is searching for a buyer for its German retail business.
"It is a sign of how serious we are but we should remember that eight out of ten deals fail at this point," the source told Reuters of the Commerzbank-Dresdner talks. "Due diligence is the second phase of a merger negotiation. Then comes the contract negotiations and finally signing."
A deal between Commerzbank and Dresdner would be the biggest in Germany since UniCredit swooped on Bavarian bank HVB three years ago. It would solve Allianz's long-running spat with investors who have been angry about what they see as a failed attempt to combine insurance and banking.
And it would give a leg up to Commerzbank, which has long floundered with a tiny share of Germany's overcrowded banking sector.