Barclays Buy ING

Barclays Bank have agreed to buy ING Direct UK. This is a good result for Barclays but not a terribly good one for savers. ING often have very competitive savings rates and the acquisition by Barclays will increase market share but do little for a competitive market. You may have seen the ING adverts which are a little odd, but attempt to create the sense of a no nonsense bank.

A Great Deal for Barclays

ING UK was launched in 2003 and has over 1.5m customers. It is entirely owned by the ING Group who had over €1.279bn of assets at the end of 2011. The deal will see £10.9bn in customer deposits pass over to Barclays and around £5.6bn of mortgage borrowing. ING have a high quality mortgage book, with 50% loan-to-value, which is very strong for any Bank. It is estimated that the deal, assuming approved, will take place in Q2 of 2013. ING Direct expect that 750 of their staff will transfer to Barclays. Whilst a relative newcomer to the UK, the roots of ING can be traced back to 1845 with the merger of Levensverzekering Bank and De Nederlandenvan 1845. ING was formed in 1991.