Alliance & Leicester and Bank of Ireland confirmed they were in merger talks.
It follows reports in yesterday’s newspapers that a merger would see the pair close 10% of its UK branches. A merger would give the new group combined assets of £64bn.
Financial regulators reprimanded senior management for the leaking of details about the proposed merger and demanded no further information be released before a final decision on the deal is made.
Financial Times 25/05/99 page 21, page 24
The Daily Telegraph 25/05/99 page 29, page 31 (City Comment)
The Times 25/05/99 page 27, page 29 (Commentary)
The Independent 25/05/99 page 21
The Guardian 25/05/99 page 24, page 25 (Notebook)
