Dutch State sells half of remaining interest in ABN AMRO

The Dutch State is increasingly withdrawing from ABN AMRO. The stake in the bank is almost halved, from 20.7 percent to 10.5 percent. This brings a complete privatization of the bank another big step closer.

The sale follows years in which the government gradually reduced its position in ABN AMRO. The bank came into the hands of the State during the credit crisis to prevent a collapse.

NLFI, the foundation that manages interests in financial institutions on behalf of the State, has announced a new sales programme. The shares are sold through a pre-agreed trading plan.

BofA Securities Europe executes the program. The sale will begin in the coming days and will continue until the predetermined maximum number of depositary receipts for shares has been sold. After that, the state interest must have been reduced to about 10.5 percent.

It's not the first big sale. In April, the stake had already been reduced to just under 25 percent. A subsequent round of sales in July yielded the State about 2.5 billion euros.

The government once owned the entire bank. ABN AMRO was nationalised during the credit crisis of 2008, after the bank had run into major financial problems.

The procedure was costly. The nationalisation of ABN AMRO cost the Dutch taxpayer a total of 28.1 billion euros.

In 2015, ABN AMRO returned to the stock exchange. At that time, the State did not immediately sell all shares. Since then, the government interest has been phased out step by step.

The sharp increase in ABN AMRO's share since the beginning of this year helps with this. If ultimately the remaining interest is also sold, the State does not seem to have to take a loss on the rescue operation according to current expectations.

ABN AMRO CEO Marguerite Bérard welcomes the further sale. She told Bloomberg that the move was expected.

The further withdrawal of the State coincides with a major reorganisation at ABN AMRO. The bank announced last year that it would be cutting more than 5,000 jobs to improve profitability.

Part of it has now disappeared. In the second quarter alone, the number of jobs decreased by 253. According to the available figures, ABN AMRO has thus achieved about 45 percent of the planned job reduction.

With a state interest of 10.5 percent, the role of the Dutch government as a shareholder will again be significantly reduced. The privatisation that began with the IPO in 2015 is thus getting closer and closer to the final phase more than ten years later.