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A consortium led by the Royal Bank of Scotland is expected to claim victory in the battle to secure ABN Amro.

RBS, Belgian-Dutch group Fortis and Spain's Santander may announce as early as this afternoon that they have secured enough support from ABN investors for their €71 billion (£49 billion) mostly-cash offer.

The Times newspaper, which made the claim, said the consortium is subsequently expected to declare its bid unconditional on Wednesday. However the paper, citing unidentified sources, claims that RBS could be forced to issue a statement today if the Dutch takeover authority deems it necessary.

Expectations of an RBS statement come after rival bidder Barclays confirmed on Friday that it had withdrawn its offer for ABN, after failing to secure enough support for the offer.

Barclays, which had been involved in a long-running battle with RBS to gain control of ABN, saw the value of its part-share offer slump after weeks of turmoil on the financial markets. The Barclays bid was subsequently worth more than €10 billion (£6.9 billion) less than the RBS consortium offer by the time it pulled out of the takeover race.

However over the weekend Barclays chief executive John Varley insisted that RBS and its bidding partners were paying too high a price to secure ABN.

"We weren't prepared to secure a win at any price. I think the consortium has overpaid," Mr Varley told several Sunday newspapers.

ABN stressed on September 16th that while Barclays' offer supported ABN's objective of keeping itself intact, the consortium bid was "clearly superior" financially.

Shareholders in the Dutch bank had until Friday lunchtime to back RBS' bid, which if confirmed successful could lead to a break up of ABN.

An acquisition deal between the RBS consortium and ABN would represent Europe's largest ever banking takeover.