Clydesdale Bank has launched a bid to buy the Williams and Glyn bank from Royal Bank of Scotland only weeks before the sale deadline.
The company has made a "a preliminary' offer to take control of the brand which the part-taxpayer owned bank failed recently to sell to Santander.
Williams and Glyn consists of 307 Royal Bank of Scotland branches in England and Wales and NatWest branches in Scotland.
RBS was required by the EU rid itself of the brand, because the Government's stake in the bank is regarded as state aid.
The Clydesdale bid is the latest twist in a seven-year sale process that has suffered multiple delays and setbacks and has cost RBS at least £1.5bn.
Santander previously launched two bids for the bank, but dropped out of talks with RBS for because of a disagreement over price.
RBS is meant to divest the 300-branch business by the end of next year under EU rules for receiving a £45bn bailout during the financial crisis.
The Williams & Glyn business is valued at around £1.3bn, but analysts expect it to be sold for less.
RBS is reportedly expected to inform the market that it may miss a 2017 deadline for fully offloading the business, because of the cumbersome process of divesting the branches from its IT systems.
RBS third-quarter figures are due out on Friday, amid speculation of a loss of £231m.
A Clydesdale spokesman confirmed that discussions were on-going with RBS and that a "preliminary non-binding proposal" had been made for Williams & Glyn.
It added: "There can be no certainty that any transaction will occur"
"A transaction will only be pursued if it is determined by the Board to be in the best interests of shareholders."sion. We have been clear that there is interest in the business and this remains the case.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here