July 15, 2008 | posted by Michael Baxter in Banking |

Roll up, roll up, buy your bank now. You don’t need to fork out much money, you just need deep pockets to weather the next two years.

So, as Queen once said, “another one bites the dust.” First there was Northern Rock, then Bradford and Bingley, now it’s the Alliance and Leicester.

And screw your eyes up, try and ignore all that talk of banking crisis, forget about the troubles of Fannie and Freddie, and it seems that the Spanish bank Santander has bought up another bit of Britain on the cheap.

At 299p, Santander is paying a price which is around a third of the share price a year ago. For that matter, the £1.3 billion offer from Santander is around a quarter of the price floated a year ago when Credit Agricole looked at buying up the British bank. Even Santander itself looked at forking out twice that amount last December.

So, it appears, the new Spanish Armada is here and, this time, the British establishment are too busy bowling at Bradford and Bingley to stop it.

The Times, for example, quoted David Cumming, head of UK equities at Standard Life Investments, as saying: “They are acquiring A&L on give-away terms. I would be amazed if no one else counters with a higher offer in the next few months.”

But now, unscrew your eyes and see this deal for what it really is.

The banks are suffering wave after wave of devastation. The US subprime crisis was bad enough. The fall into ruin for Fred and Fan shows how much further there is to go. In the UK, falling house prices are only beginning to take their toll.

The truth is, the Alliance and Leicester probably couldn’t say yes fast enough, and just hoped it didn’t let its corporate poker face show too much relief.

The Competition Commission should have a field day with this one. Since the Spanish bank already owns Abbey, that now makes two banks under the fold, and around 25 per cent of the mortgage market.

But, in times like these, fears on competition can be put aside. Who cares about that when the loss of competition entailed if banks start collapsing will be far worse.

On this occasion, the beacons across Britain should be lit, in welcome to the new Spanish invasion.