http://www.money.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2005/01/03/cnabb03.xml&sSheet=/money/2005/01/03/ixfrontcity.html

Banco Santander, which bought Abbey National in November, said yesterday that it would need a year before the Spanish bank was ready to consider more big deals.

Emilio Botin, chairman, said Santander's priority was to work on the integration of the £9.65billion takeover, Europe's biggest cross-border banking deal.

He told Spanish newspaper El Pais: "We need a few months or a year of adaptation before we can think about launching ourselves on new expansion projects." Santander is better hedged against currency fluctuations now that it takes 40pc of its revenues in pounds, he added.

Mr Botin was upbeat about the bank's performance, forecasting that profits for 2005 would outstrip last year's figure. He said: "We are convinced that [this year] we are going to improve on our 2004 results."

Santander has not yet reported its full 2004 results but net attributable profits jumped 64pc to €3.17billion (£2.3billion) in the first nine months of the year.

Signalling a search for strong growth in South America, Mr Botin added: "We have a lot of potential for organic growth."

Things are moving spectacularly fast at Abbey and I would be surprised if they didn't achieve the cost cutting they set at the takeover.

All looking good from a shareholders point of view?

GO