"First Rand’s Laurie Dippenaar and I were saying how can we make this merger go through," jokes Nallie Bosman, group chief executive of Absa, South Africa’s second biggest bank, referring to Nedcor’s bid for Standard Bank Investment (Stanbic).
Absa and First Rand, the third largest bank, are hoping that if Nedcor’s R30bn ($4.65bn) hostile bid for Stanbic is successful, the two banks will be so busy merging they will lose market share.