For the Chancellor, George Osborne, the point of the sale is to stimulate competition in the retail banking market.

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The vibrancy of America's retail banking market owes something to its fragmentation.

ECONOMIST: Retail banks

For foreign banks, that represents one of the few remaining opportunities to enter Brazil's potentially fast-growing retail-banking market.

ECONOMIST: Brazilian banking

The OFT may have identified a problem in the retail-banking market but it has been reticent about proposing solutions.

ECONOMIST: Consumer banking

In France, to private-sector bankers' fury, large chunks of the retail-banking market are dominated by savings banks and the post office, which enjoy tax and legal privileges that allow them to offer particularly advantageous savings accounts.

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Moreover, it would be instrumental in fostering the efficiency of the internal capital markets and market integration in retail and corporate banking (see Barba Navaretti et al. 2009).

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The firm is a leader in investment banking, asset management, private banking, private equity, custody and transaction services and retail and middle market financial services.

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Its Austrian rival, Erste Bank, thinks that retail banking is the main source of profit in the region, and so has bought retail banks with market shares of around 20% in the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

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