Santander to send out Abbey brief

BANCO Santander will send details of its £8.8bn takeover offer for Abbey National to the High Street bank's 1.8m shareholders on Friday.

The extraordinary general meeting to vote on the deal is expected to be held at the Barbican in London. Three dates, 11, 26 and 27 October have been pencilled in.

Abbey sources said there was 'nothing very seismic' in the document.

Meanwhile, although Northern Rock is unlikely to enter the bidding process for Abbey, it wants to retain an adviser during what is a turbuluent time for the UK banking industry. Northern has brought in investment bank Citigroup to advise it over the sector shake-up.

Santander launched a charm offensive last week aimed at the 80,000 independent financial advisers who sell Abbey mortgages and products.

It promised them much-improved computer and internet systems and said it wanted to drive volumes higher through the intermediaries as well as the branch network.

BSCH vice president Juan Rodriguez Inciarte has written to the top 50 firms of IFAs that work with Abbey, which should mean the letter filters down to 60,000 individual financial advisers. An advertising campaign in the financial services trade Press should hit the remaining 20,000 Abbey product sellers