The Dutch central bank has approved the overall break-up of ABN Amro after its takeover by a group led by Royal Bank of Scotland, according to documents obtained by ANP-Reuters. “I am delighted to inform you that I have now received the Dutch Central Bank's declaration of no objection to the consortium's overall transition plan, which we submitted in December,” ABN Chief Executive Mark Fisher wrote in a letter to ABN's employees. DNB spokesman Tobias Oudejans declined to comment on the contents of the letter. An ABN spokeswoman confirmed the contents of the letter sent by Fisher, who was sent from RBS to manage the break-up of ABN over the next two to three years. He said the approval was “slightly ahead of schedule”. RBS, Spain's Santander and Belgian-Dutch Fortis bought ABN for 70 billion euros in October 2007, beating a lower offer from British bank Barclays. Different parts of ABN will be split and taken over by their new owners over time, Fisher added. Fortis is buying ABN's Dutch retail banking network as well as its asset management unit, while RBS will take over ABN's global wholesale banking operations. Santander is buying ABN's Latin American business, while Antonveneta is being sold by Santander to Banca Met dei Paschi di Siena in a separate deal. ABN's asset management unit is set to be taken over by Fortis in April, which is the first part of ABN to be spun off. That had already been approved by the central bank. “In addition to the scheduled forthcoming separation of Asset Management and Antonveneta, we will begin implementation activities in a large number of countries and businesses,” Fisher said. __
