HBOS, the UK's fourth biggest lender, has expressed interest in acquiring a number of Woolwich branches which Barclays is closing, according to the Financial Times.
Barclays recently announced plans to rebrand its Woolwich outlets as Barclays and close branches where a Woolwich and a Barclays branch are within 300 meters of each other. The Financial Times has reported that HBOS may be interested in buying some of the unwanted branches in order to expand it own network.
HBOS, the banking group created in 2001 by the merger of Halifax and Bank of Scotland, has reportedly approached Barclay’s property agents with a list of 40 sites it is interested in acquiring. Woolwich could provide us with a number of ready-made sites for our branch expansion program, HBOS head of branch expansion David Young was quoted as saying.
Halifax said in March that it planned to open 100 new branches within the next five years in the south of England, the largest expansion for the bank since the 1970’s. HBOS currently has around 1,320 branches throughout the UK.