British bank Barclays received Dutch regulatory approval to buy rival ABN Amro, it said yesterday, as ABN's share price showed little signs of recovery after Friday's beating.

Barclays is offering about €64 billion for the Netherlands' biggest bank, while Royal Bank of Scotland , together with Belgian-Dutch Fortis and Spain's Santander, has made a mostly cash €71 billion bid for ABN.

Barclays said it had received a "declaration of no objection" from the Dutch finance ministry, in conjunction with the country's central bank.

"A possible merger of Barclays and ABN Amro raises no objections from finance minister Wouter Bos," the Dutch finance ministry said in a statement.

The RBS-led consortium expects a decision from the Dutch finance ministry by mid-September. A finance ministry spokesman said a decision on the consortium's plans will take more time as the group made its request later than Barclays did.

Shares in ABN Amro rebounded 1.9 per cent to €34.48 yesterday after falling 3.5 per cent in Friday's stock market sell-off, but they are still almost 10 per cent below the value of the offer from the RBS-led consortium, which is widely expected to win the takeover battle.

Barclays' bid is currently worth about €34 per ABN share. The consortium's offer is worth just over €38.

"The consortium's offer is still uncertain. If something happens to the consortium, you fall back to Barclays' bid," said AEK analyst Carlo Ponfoort. ABN shares fell as much as 11 per cent on Friday amid worries Fortis might not be able to obtain €24 billion in financing it needs for its part of the deal, but Fortis said it was confident about its financing plans.