NatWest
NatWest is the product of a merger between Westminster Bank and National Provincial Bank in 1968, and enjoyed initial success under deregulation in the 1980s. But the bank's fortunes took a turn for the worse worst with the stock market crash of 1987 and the "Blue Arrow" affair, which dragged it into a long and costly fraud case.
It was eventually taken over by Royal Bank of Scotland in 2000, which became one of the biggest banking players in Britain as a result of the acquisition. Natwest has retained its ownership of Coutts, the private bank which famously counts the Queen as a client.
