Withdrawal of offer for ABN AMRO and restart of buyback programme

The Offer is not being made, directly or indirectly, in or into, and consequently this announcement is not for distribution, directly or indirectly, in or into, Italy, Japan or any other jurisdiction where the making of this Offer is not in compliance with local laws. This document shall not constitute an offer to sell or buy or the solicitation of an offer to buy or sell securities, nor shall there be any sale or purchase of securities in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful.

Barclays announces that as at 4 October 2007, the Closing Date of its offer (“Offer”) for ABN AMRO Holding N.V. (“ABN AMRO”), not all the conditions relating to the Offer were fulfilled. In particular, the condition that at least 80% of ABN AMRO’s issued ordinary share capital as at the Closing Date (excluding any ordinary shares held by ABN AMRO) were tendered, has not been fulfilled. As a result, Barclays withdraws its Offer with immediate effect. Any tenders of ordinary shares, American Depositary Shares, formerly convertible preference shares or DR preference shares under the Offer prior to or after the date of this announcement will be deemed not to have been made.

As at 4 October 2007, 4,410,136 ordinary shares in the share capital of ABN AMRO were tendered under the Offer, as well as 782,945 American Depositary Shares. In addition 5,260 formerly convertible preference shares and 8,466,875 DR preference shares were tendered under the Offer.

The merger protocol entered into between Barclays and ABN AMRO on 23 April 2007 (and amended on 23 July and 30 July 2007) is now terminated in accordance with its terms and Barclays is requesting payment of the €200 million break fee to which it is contractually entitled. This break fee will significantly exceed the costs that Barclays incurred in connection with the Offer.

The Barclays share buyback programme will be terminated today and will restart without the restrictions specific to the Offer as announced on 2 August 2007. To date Barclays has in aggregate acquired approximately 140.9 million shares for cancellation at an average price of 622.5 pence. Under the new, restarted programme, up to £1.55 billion remains available to purchase a maximum of 196.0 million shares for cancellation during the period from 8 October to 31 December 2007. The objective of the restarted programme remains to immunise the dilutive effect of the issuance of shares to China Development Bank and Temasek on existing shareholders.