SANTANDER

Santander is the third largest bank in the UK in terms of deposits, the second largest in terms of mortgages held, and the fourth largest in terms of branches operated. As of January 2010, Santander has 25 million customers in the UK. Grupo Santander has numerous operations in Latin America. It has rebranded most of the subsidiaries it has acquired to Santander. Grupo Santander consists of more than 170, 000 employees, 90.1 million customers, 13, 390 branches and 2.27 million shareholders. Retail banking the main aspect of Santander's operations generates 82% of the group's profit. Santander UK plc is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Spanish Grupo Santander. Based in the United Kingdom, it operates under the name of Santander.

The bank retained the London headquarters of Abbey National and renamed other regional buildings under its own name. The Abbey name was retained for Abbey International and Abbey for Intermediaries, a division of the bank offering Abbey branded mortgages provided by Santander UK plc. Banco Santander, founded in 1857 in Santander, (Cantabria, Spain) has been the largest bank in Europe in terms of market capitalisation. The 1999 merger of Banco Santander (founded in 1857) and Banco Central Hispano (founded in 1991) following the merger of Banco Central [est. 1919] and Banco Hispanoamericano [est. 1900]), created Banco Santander Central Hispano, or BSCH. Currently, Santander is a corporate sponsor of the Ferrari Formula 1 team and the Copa Libertadores de America. In 2004, the Spanish Santander acquired Abbey National for £9bn. As a result of the 2008 banking crisis, Abbey purchased the savings business and branches of Bradford & Bingley in September 2008 following the nationalisation of B&B by HM Government. The purchase of Alliance & Leicester by Santander had been agreed earlier that month. Santander UK plc was formed by the renaming of Abbey National plc which also included the branch network and savings business of Bradford & Bingley plc on 11 January 2010.