Opaque foreign investors could own almost a fifth of one of Britain’s biggest banks, under the terms of a capital-raising being considered by Barclays. The country’s third-largest bank said yesterday that it was considering Britain’s largest placing and pre-emptive offer of shares, likely to be in the region of £4 billion. An announcement is expected within a fortnight.

The bank is thought to be lining up a cash injection from one or more sovereign wealth funds (SWFs), the low-profile funds originally set up to help oil-rich nations to diversify their wealth. SWFs have poured $69 billion into financial stocks in the past year.

Raising £4 billion would give the new shareholders an 18 per cent stake in the bank. Barclays first raised cash from foreign investors last August to help to fund its failed ABN Amro bid. But Chinese commentators yesterday cast doubt on whether China Development Bank, which took a 3 per cent stake last August, would return for a larger share of Barclays. The Chinese bank has been criticised at home for its original £1.5 billion investment, which has more than halved in value.

Temasek, the Singaporean fund that spent £1 billion on Barclays’ shares last August, said that it had not yet decided whether to invest further.

Under the scheme being considered by Barclays, SWFs would underwrite the capital-raising and existing retail and institutional shareholders would be offered the opportunity to take part at the same price. Despite earlier indications, Barclays is likely to offer the new shares at a small discount to the current share price.

Investors said that they had not yet been consulted by Barclays about the scheme. A leading investor said: “As long as they give us an opportunity to participate on the same terms, we don’t mind.”

Barclays hopes that this capital-raising structure will circumvent rules that force companies to ask shareholders’ permission to issue new stock worth more than 5 per cent of the market capitalisation. Weeks of waiting for shareholders to vote at an extraordinary general meeting gives short-sellers an opportunity to drive down a company’s share price.

Shares in HBOS, which is raising £4 billion in a rights issue, have fluctuated wildly. A banker said: “After watching HBOS, you don’t want to be hanging around for all that ballyhoo in the market for several weeks if you can find a way around it.” It was claimed last night that Barclays had been lobbying the Government to relax pre-emption rights, which give existing shareholders first refusal on new shares and can slow attempts to raise cash. Barclays declined to comment. Investors and analysts said that it would become clear whether an EGM was needed only once Barclays gave further details.

Shareholders have been sceptical about Barclays’ writedowns, which have been less savage than those of competitors. The bank wrote down £1.7 billion in the first quarter, on top of £1.6 billion last year. Bankers suggested that by having SWFs underwrite its capital-raising, Barclays would not have to reveal further potential credit-crunch losses.

Barclay’s shares closed 3.46 per cent higher at 329p after the bank said that pre-tax profit for May was “well ahead” of that at the same time last year.

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