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UK to restart RBS stake sale by March 2019; EU to impose binding MREL targets

* The EU's Single Resolution Board will impose binding targets for the minimum requirement for own funds and eligible liabilities, or MREL, for the "majority of the largest and most complex banking groups" in the eurozone, Reuters reported. An insider told the newswire that some 35 to 40 banks will need to raise their loss-absorbing capital buffers within four years at maximum, potentially increasing their funding costs.

* The ECB is reassessing its corporate bond purchase plan, with the Market Operations Committee reviewing the strategy's effectiveness and its influence on the credit supply to the euro area economy, after having spent €126 billion so far, insiders told Bloomberg News.

* European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority Chairman Gabriel Bernardino yesterday called for harmonized insurance guarantee schemes, saying they can help protect policyholders, Reuters reported.

* Banque de France Governor François Villeroy de Galhau called for more coherence and consolidation in European banking and called on the European Banking Authority to publish a list of obstacles to cross-border fusions due to regulation and supervision, so that they can be removed, Les Echos reported.

* Banks are testing intrusive comportment tools, including vibration sensors, voice analyzers and algorithms of client/trader behavior, linked to artificial intelligence, to watch over their traders, Les Echos wrote.

UK AND IRELAND

* U.K. Chancellor Philip Hammond said in his Autumn Budget statement that he will set aside "over the next two years another £3 billion" for Brexit preparations, having already invested nearly £700 million.

* Meanwhile, the U.K. government will seek to relaunch the privatization of its majority stake in Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc by the end of the 2018-2019 fiscal year. The government expects to off-load £15 billion worth of shares, or two-thirds of its roughly 73% stake in RBS, by the end of the budget's five-year forecast period, which runs through 2022.

* Standard Chartered Plc is nearing a deal to sell its real estate principal finance unit, which has around $700 million in investments mainly across different countries in Asia, to private equity firm Actis, insiders told Reuters. The U.K. lender is also in talks to sell its private equity unit.

* Sabre Insurance Co. Ltd. set a price range of 220 pence to 240 pence per ordinary share for its planned IPO, representing a market capitalization of between £550 million and £600 million on admission.

* CMC Markets Plc said Chairman Simon Waugh will retire from the board, effective from Dec. 31, and will be succeed by James Richards.

GERMANY, SWITZERLAND AND AUSTRIA

* As part of measures to safeguard the Swiss banking system's stability, Switzerland's government said all of the country's banks will have to maintain a leverage ratio of at least 3% from 2018, Reuters reported.

* St. Galler Kantonalbank is taking over M.M.Warburg Bank (Schweiz) AG's private banking business for an undisclosed price. The transaction is expected to complete in the first quarter of 2018.

* Cyber criminals have targeted UBS Group AG and Raiffeisen Schweiz Genossenschaft with malware designed to access customer accounts via mobile banking apps, Finews.com wrote, citing Computerwelt.

* Swiss Re AG appointed Jerome Jean Haegeli chief economist, effective in January 2018. He replaces Kurt Karl.

* Harald Egger, UBS' head of group corporate services and sourcing, is replacing UBS India chief Aashish Kamat in Mumbai, Finews.com reported.

* Deutsche Bank AG's chief strategist, Ulrich Stephan, discouraged investors from investing in bitcoin, saying the fluctuations of the volatile cryptocurrency were too great while regulation for it was too scant, according to Reuters.

* Deutsche Ruckversicherung AG CEO Arno Junke is stepping down at the end of the year, eight months before his contract expires, Börsen-Zeitung reported. While Junke is officially leaving due to personal reasons, the newspaper pointed to increasing difficulties between Junke and Supervisory Board Chairman Frank Walthes as a main factor behind the move.

* Sparkasse KölnBonn is set to eliminate 850 jobs in the next five years due to increasing digitization of business processes and online operations, Handelsblatt reported.

FRANCE AND BENELUX

* National Front leader Marine Le Pen said yesterday that she and her party intend to file complaints against Société Générale SA, its unit Crédit du Nord SA and HSBC Holdings Plc for shutting down her and her party's bank accounts, Reuters reported.

* BNP Paribas SA said it maintains its Basel III common equity Tier 1 ratio target of 12% in 2020, after it dropped a tier in the Financial Stability Board's 2017 list of global systemically important banks. The French lender, whose fully loaded CET1 ratio stood at 11.8% at September-end, saw its additional capital buffer requirement drop to 1.5% from 2.0% last year.

* French asset manager TOBAM SAS yesterday launched TOBAM Bitcoin Fund, an unregulated alternative investment fund, which will allow institutional investors to gain exposure to the cryptocurrency. The fund is the first of its kind in Europe, according to TOBAM.

* An initial coin offering aiming to raise between €15 million to €20 million will be launched from Dec. 11 to Jan. 1, 2018, for a mutual neo-bank called Hush in Luxembourg, La Tribune reported.

SPAIN AND PORTUGAL

* Banco Mare Nostrum SA will close 24 offices in Spain next month in preparation for its merger with Bankia SA, Cinco Días wrote. All staff affected by the closures will be moved to other offices.

* The Spanish banks have not manifested interest in acquiring the operations of Banco Caixa Geral Espanha, the Spanish arm of Portugal's Caixa Geral de Depósitos SA, Jornal de Negócios wrote. CDG noted that the sale process of its unit in Spain has not yet officially started.

ITALY AND GREECE

* National Bank of Greece SA reported losses after tax of €35 million and €178 million in the third quarter and first nine months of 2017, respectively. The lender booked a €16 million profit in the third quarter of 2016, but recorded a loss of €2.96 billion for the first nine months of that year.

* Banca Carige SpA CEO Paolo Fiorentino said the bank's €560 million capital increase was now "ironclad" as the company warned that it would struggle to survive in 2018 without the additional funds, Reuters reported. Fiorentino ruled out "any additional capital raising." The lender forecast a significant loss for 2017, due to charges related to agreed bad loan disposals and layoffs in the fourth quarter.

* Unione di Banche Italiane SpA CEO Victor Massiah said he saw Italy's banking sector continuing with domestic consolidation before cross-border deals would be considered, according to Reuters.

* Mediobanca - Banca di Credito Finanziario SpA entered into a long-term strategic partnership with RAM Active Investments SA, under which the Italian company will acquire a 69% interest in the Switzerland-based investment manager. The transaction is expected to complete in the first half of 2018.

NORDIC COUNTRIES

* Nordea Bank AB (publ) issued €750 million of Additional Tier 1 notes with a coupon of 3.5%.

* Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken AB named Erika Lundquist head of private banking. Lundquist previously served as the lender's head in Luxembourg.

EASTERN EUROPE

* The Turkish lira tumbled to a new record low of 3.98 against the U.S. dollar yesterday, prompting the country's prime minister, Binali Yildirim, and the central bank to ease investor fears that worsening relations with the U.S. were "temporary," Reuters reported. The central bank moved to tighten liquidity earlier this week as the lira tumbled amid concerns on U.S.-Turkey relations and political pressure on the central bank.

* Russia's Federal Antimonopoly Service allowed PJSC Sovcombank to acquire a 16.7% stake in JSCB RosEvroBank (JSC), Vedomosti reported. Sovcombank, which already controls 28.6% of RosEvroBank, had sought preliminary regulatory approval earlier this month as it considers the purchase, but has not yet made a final decision, the newspaper earlier said.

* PJSC Bank Saint-Petersburg divested its 5.2% stake in Vozrozhdenie Bank, Banki.ru reported.

* The Russian Deposit Insurance Agency has imposed 603 million Russian rubles in fines on lenders participating in Russia's bank recapitalization program since the launch of the scheme in 2014, Vedomosti reported. The lenders that have breached the requirements of the program include PJSC TRANSKAPITALBANK, PJSC BANK URALSIB, Vozrozhdenie, JSC Russian Agricultural Bank and JSCB NOVIKOMBANK.

* The Polish Financial Supervision Authority warned potential investors about risks associated with initial coin and token offerings, pointing to the lack of regulatory framework and deficiencies in blockchain technology, among other things, Rzeczpospolita reported.

* The Polish Financial Supervision Authority asked Commerzbank AG unit mBank SA to maintain an additional capital buffer of 4.1 percentage points on its foreign-currency mortgage exposure, up from the previous requirement of 3.81 percentage points, news agency PAP said.

IN OTHER PARTS OF THE WORLD

Asia-Pacific: MetLife open to resume ANZ deal talks; Malaysian crypto regulation moves forward

Middle East & Africa: 2 UAE banks in M&A talks; Zambia cuts rates; Mozambique eyes Moza stake sale

Latin America: Banco Finansur lands buyer; Argentina central bank holds rate

North America: Citibank fined over student loan failures; Wells Fargo sued over 401(k) plan

North America Insurance: Minuteman members get more time to select plan; Harvey loss estimated at $15.9B

NOW FEATURED ON S&P GLOBAL MARKET INTELLIGENCE

EU insurance regulator seeks expanded powers to deal with failing firms: National regulators should be obliged to give the regulator early warning when they see an insurance firm with cross-border operations is struggling, the Chairman of the regulator, Gabriel Bernardino, said.

Bank of France head: Regulation should not act as brake on cross-border mergers: Cross-border consolidation would help lenders diversify their risks and strengthen the single market, said François Villeroy de Galhau, who is also a member of the European Central Bank governing council.

Western Union to partner with British fintech Bud: At the Fintech World Forum in London, Western Union announced a partnership with U.K.-based fintech Bud, which allow users to make international transfers via its money management platform.

Regulator increasingly concerned about insufficient insurer Brexit planning: Bank of France Governor François Villeroy de Galhau, meanwhile, warned that European authorities would not tolerate the setting up of "empty shell corporations" in the EU by U.K.-based firms.

Leo Magno, Ed Meza, Meike Wijers, Gerard O'Dwyer, Beata Fojcik, Heather O'Brian, Brian McCulloch, Sophie Davies and Mariana Aldano contributed to this report.

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