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Northern Rock shares fell as much as 12 per cent in early trading, following claims savers have withdrawn billions of pounds from the troubled bank.

A total of £10.5 billion has been withdrawn from the bank by savers since the lender approached the Bank of England for emergency funds in September, the Daily Telegraph reported today.

The paper, which claims to have seen the figure outlined in a sales document sent to potential Northern Rock suitors, claims that retail deposits held at the bank now total just £13.5 billion.

It adds that the withdrawal of such a large amount of cash raises problems for the bank's potential buyers and says the development increases the chances that the government could be forced to put the lender into administration.

The report comes after Bank of England governor Mervyn King revealed earlier this week that chancellor Alistair Darling had vetoed a secret takeover approach for Northern Rock made by Lloyds TSB.

In a BBC radio interview Mr King confirmed that the chancellor had rejected the Lloyds TSB takeover approach for Northern Rock on the weekend before the damaging run on the Newcastle-based bank occurred.

Northern Rock savers rushed to withdraw their cash from the lender in September after it emerged that it had asked the Bank of England for an emergency loan, due to liquidity problems prompted by the ongoing global credit squeeze.

The government was subsequently forced to guarantee the savings of Northern Rock customers, in order to restore confidence in the UK banking system.

The lender has declined to comment on the report concerning the alleged amount of cash that has been withdrawn by its customers since the crisis.

Meanwhile a separate report in the Financial Times says that Northern Rock's advisers are thought to have approached up to 50 potential bidders, including the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, in order to secure a sale of the firm.

US private equity group JC Flowers and a consortium led by Sir Richard Branson's Virgin group have already both indicated that they are considering tabling official bids for Northern Rock.