Banco Santander starts buying banking equities worldwide

One of the biggest bank of Europe Spanish Santander has announced purchasing of the retail banking division SEB (Sweden) which allowed the company to consolidate its full service operation in Germany, says Reuters.  According to the official statement Santander buys 173 branches, 2,000 employees and around 1 million private customers in Germany.

The price of the purchase is 555 million euros ($699 million).

"Germany is a core market for Santander. This acquisition is a significant step toward achieving our goal of being a full service retail bank in Europe's largest market," said Emilio Botin,  Chairman of Santander.

Also it is known that Santander is searching for opportunities to expand its business in Latin America and to increase its presence in Colombia and Peru. Earlier the bank wanted to purchase 318 UK branches of Royal Bank of Scotland and to expand its presence in the US owing to M&T.