RBS 2012 Annual Report Download - page 39

RBS GROUP 2012
37
In the Report and Accounts, and unless specified otherwise, the term
‘company’ or ‘RBSG’ means The Royal Bank of Scotland Group plc,
‘RBS’, ‘RBS Group’ or the ‘Group’ means the company and its
subsidiaries, ‘the Royal Bank’ means The Royal Bank of Scotland plc and
‘NatWest’ means National Westminster Bank Plc.
The company publishes its financial statements in pounds sterling (‘£’ or
‘sterling’). The abbreviations ‘£m’ and ‘£bn’ represent millions and
thousands of millions of pounds sterling, respectively, and references to
‘pence’ represent pence in the United Kingdom (‘UK’). Reference to
‘dollars’ or ‘$’ are to United States of America (‘US’) dollars. The
abbreviations ‘$m’ and ‘$bn’ represent millions and thousands of millions
of dollars, respectively, and references to ‘cents’ represent cents in the
US. The abbreviation ‘€’ represents the ‘euro’, the European single
currency, and the abbreviations ‘€m’ and ‘€bn’ represent millions and
thousands of millions of euros, respectively.
Certain information in this report is presented separately for domestic and
foreign activities. Domestic activities primarily consist of the UK domestic
transactions of the Group. Foreign activities comprise the Group's
transactions conducted through those offices in the UK specifically
organised to service international banking transactions and transactions
conducted through offices outside the UK.
The geographic analysis in the Business Review, including the average
balance sheet and interest rates, changes in net interest income and
average interest rates, yields, spreads and margins in this report have
been compiled on the basis of location of office - UK and overseas.
Management believes that this presentation provides more useful
information on the Group's yields, spreads and margins of the Group's
activities than would be provided by presentation on the basis of the
domestic and foreign activities analysis used elsewhere in this report as it
more closely reflects the basis on which the Group is managed. ‘UK’ in
this context includes domestic transactions and transactions conducted
through the offices in the UK which service international banking
transactions.
The results, assets and liabilities of individual business units are
classified as trading or non-trading based on their predominant activity.
Although this method may result in some non-trading activity being
classified as trading, and vice versa, the Group believes that any
resulting misclassification is not material.
International Financial Reporting Standards
As required by the Companies Act 2006 and Article 4 of the European
Union IAS Regulation, the consolidated financial statements of the Group
are prepared in accordance with International Financial Reporting
Standards issued by the International Accounting Standards Board
(IASB) and interpretations issued by the IFRS Interpretations Committee
of the IASB as adopted by the European Union (together ‘IFRS’). They
also comply with IFRS as issued by the IASB.
RBS Holdings N.V. (formerly ABN AMRO Holding N.V.)
In 2007, RFS Holdings B.V., which was jointly owned by the Group, the
Dutch State (successor to Fortis) and Santander (together, the
“Consortium Members”) completed the acquisition of ABN AMRO Holding
N.V.
On 1 April 2010, the businesses acquired by the Dutch State were
transferred to ABN AMRO Group N.V., itself owned by the Dutch State. In
connection with the transfer ABN AMRO Holding N.V. was renamed RBS
Holdings N.V. and its banking subsidiary was renamed The Royal Bank
of Scotland N.V. (“RBS N.V.”). Certain assets of RBS N.V. continue to be
shared by the Consortium Members.
In October 2011, the Group completed the transfer of a substantial part of
the UK activities of RBS N.V. to the Royal Bank pursuant to Part VII of
the UK Financial Services and Markets Act 2000. Substantially all of the
Netherlands and EMEA businesses were transferred in September 2012.
Further transfers are expected to take place during 2013 but are subject
to certain authorisations including regulatory approval where necessary.
The Group now anticipates that the transfers in China will be completed
at a later date.
Presentation of information