Barclays was under pressure yesterday to sweeten its €64.8 billion (£43.8 billion) all-share offer for ABN Amro, after a rival bidding consortium put a cash-heavy revised bid for the Dutch bank on the table.

Sources close to Barclays said that the bank, which has until July 23 to make a formal offer, would not back away from the battle for ABN, despite what some described yesterday as a killer blow from the Royal Bank of Scotland-led consortium.

“Now that the RBS consortium have put forward a competitive proposition, to be competitive Barclays has to do something and that will involve putting some cash on the table,” a source said.

Unveiling its revised offer for ABN, the consortium said that its €71.1 billion bid would comprise 93 per cent cash, up from 79 per cent.

The Dutch bank’s board must now decide whether to continue to recommend Barclays’ offer or shift its support to the consortium. ABN’s management are thought to be exerting pressure on Barclays to reveal whether it plans to improve its offer.

“If Barclays doesn’t raise its bid, that would present not inconsiderable presentational challenges for ABN if it continued to recommend Barclays’ bid,” a source close to the deal said.

Before shifting its recommendation, ABN must give Barclays five days to match a higher, rival bid.

Sources close to Barclays said that the bank was waiting for ABN’s formal response to the consortium’s bid before making its next move. The British bank must also consider likely opposition to any plan to raise its bid from shareholders, who have expressed concerns about Barclays overpaying for ABN.

Barclays and the consortium have been tussling over ABN since April. The consortium said on Friday that it would continue its pursuit of the Dutch bank, despite ABN’s decision to offload LaSalle, its Chicago-based business, which RBS had hoped to acquire via the takeover.

Bank of America will pay $21 billion for LaSalle, after waiting more than a month for the resolution of legal proceedings brought by shareholders in an attempt to block the sale of the American unit. The Dutch Supreme Court ruled last Friday that ABN was free to sell LaSalle without getting shareholder approval.

Sir Fred Goodwin, chief executive of RBS, admitted yesterday that he was disappointed to miss out on LaSalle, but he insisted that the rump of ABN remained “attractive from a strategic perspective and very attractive from a financial perspective”.

Under the terms of the revised offer, RBS’s share of the €71.1 billion bid fell from €27.2 billion to €16 billion. The bank, which would acquire ABN’s global banking and markets business and parts of its retail business, will issue €5 billion in equity to fund the deal, down from €15 billion.

The exclusion of LaSalle from the deal forced RBS to slash the synergies it expected to receive from the takeover from €2.9 billion to €1.8 billion.

Sir Fred said that ABN remained open to the possibility of switching its recommendation to his approach. “We’ve had assurances [from ABN] that this will be dealt with on a level playing field and given serious consideration,” he said.

Meanwhile, it emerged yesterday that the consortium’s bid could be derailed by a shareholder revolt at Fortis, one of the consortium members.

Shareholders in Fortis will vote on August 6 on a €13 billion rights issue by the Belgian bank.

Ton Gietman, an analyst at Petercam, a Dutch stockbroker, gave warning, that Fortis shareholders had “much to gain” from voting down the rights issue that Fortis must complete in order to participate in the bid.

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