Linklaters’ Matthew Bland is advising Lloyds Bank on its floatation of a 25% of its TSB business on the London Stock Exchange next month, on which Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer’s Julian Makin will act for the underwriters.
Bland, a corporate partner in London, has represented Lloyds Bank for nearly a decade. His position as adviser on the £1.5bn initial public offering (IPO) follows lead roles on Lloyds TSB’s takeover of HBOS in 2008 and related £5.5bn recapitalisation, as well as a £22.6bn combined rights issue in 2009.
Freshfields’ Makin, a London-based corporate partner and co-head of the firm’s mining and metals group, is advising the underwriters: JP Morgan, Citigroup, UBS and Investec.
Herbert Smith Freehills’ corporate partners James Palmer and Nick Moore and outsourcing partner Nick Pantlin have been advising TSB, working closely with general counsel Susan Crichton, on the IPO and all aspects of its separation of Lloyds Bank, including on the material business and IT services arrangements required for TSB to operate as a standalone bank post-IPO.
Lloyds became one of the Big Four banks – alongside RBS, Barclays and HSBC – after consolidation of the banking sector in the 1990s but has been forced to sell off the 631 branches that now makes up TSB after receiving government aid during the financial crisis. Lloyds had been in advanced negotiations for the Co-operative Bank to acquire the branches but the talks collapsed when the Co-op discovered a £1.5bn funding gap.
TSB, which is already the UK’s seventh largest retail bank with 4.5 million customers, will be spun off through a series of floats by the end of 2015, appeasing the European Commission in its quest for greater competition in the sector.
tom.moore@legalease.co.uk
