Erste is going for a market share of above 20% in several Central European countries.
Andreas Treichel, the boss of Erste Bank, Austria's second-biggest bank, says he will not play ball.
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Those approached so far, such as Andreas Treichl, head of Erste Bank in Austria, have declined.
Erste Group Bank said Tuesday it is also reviewing its options for its membership.
It is bidding against Erste and others for Postabank, the last big bank for sale in Hungary.
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Although Erste Bank inherited clean, ring-fenced assets, it took time to coax its once-bitten, twice-shy staff into lending again.
Sporitelna's existing loan book was ring-fenced: Erste and the government could pick the loans they wanted, and the rest went to the consolidation agency.
In 2000 Erste Bank acquired Ceska Sporitelna, the dominant savings bank in the Czech Republic, which had lent recklessly under a flawed privatisation programme.
The first had been early in 2000 when it agreed to the sale of the biggest savings bank, Ceska Sporitelna, to Erste Bank of Austria.
Erste Bank also has a policy of balancing loans and deposits.
Having the strongest retail presence, Erste Bank looks best placed to diversify, by cashing in on the strong growth in consumer finance, particularly credit cards and mortgages.
Mr Treichl joined it as a credit analyst in New York and worked in its offices in Brussels, Athens and Vienna before joining Erste Bank some 15 years ago.
Its Austrian rival, Erste Bank, thinks that retail banking is the main source of profit in the region, and so has bought retail banks with market shares of around 20% in the Czech Republic and Slovakia.
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Instead of trying to expand into investment banking, a business with juicy margins in good times but horrible losses in bad, Erste Bank has instead concentrated on expanding its retail banking business into central and eastern Europe, where it has subsidiaries stretching from Austria to Ukraine.
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