National Bank Limited (NBL) is going to be merged with United Commercial Bank (UCB).
A senior official of UCB, who attended the meeting held at Bangladesh Bank on Tuesday (9 April), confirmed it to the media.
In the presence of Bangladesh Bank Governor Abdur Rauf Talukder, some members of the board of directors and senior officials of the two banks were present in the meet.
It has been reported that UCB and NBL had earlier discussed the issue of merger under the auspices of Bangladesh Bank. The financial base of National Bank is weak where as it is strong for UCB. Bangladesh Bank has recently issued Bank Merger Policy, which has detailed guidelines for merger of weak banks with strong ones – both voluntarily and mandatorily.
It has already been decided to merge the state-owned Basic Bank with the private-owned City Bank through the mediation of the central bank. Besides, Padma Bank has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Exim Bank for their merger. At a meeting held last week, Bangladesh Bank also decided to merge BDBL with state-owned Sonali and Rajshahi Agricultural Development Bank with Bangladesh Krishi Bank.
