Allen & Overy and Addleshaw Goddard have taken the lead roles on Nationwide's takeovers of Derbyshire and Cheshire building societies.

The two smaller rivals of Nationwide have been forced into loss by credit defaults in the near-prime and sub-prime mortgage and loan portfolios.

Derbyshire Building Society, which has assets of £7.1bn, 50 branches and 485,000 members, is expected to report a pre-tax loss of £17m for the half-year to the end of June. Cheshire Building Society has around £4.9bn worth of assets, 45 branches and over 440,000 members and will record a loss of £10.5m for the half year.

Both building societies approached Nationwide independently to shore up their balance sheets.

Nationwide turned to longstanding adviser Allen & Overy, with corporate partners Richard Slynn and Alistair Asher leading the team with assistance from senior associate Ben Koehne.

Addleshaws, which has acted on the last 13 building society mergers, advised both Derbyshire and Cheshire and was led by financial services partners Adam Bennett and Ian McIntosh.

Slynn told Legal Week: "After this deal I suspect that other societies will begin to look at themselves. The feeling is that there will be more consolidation in the sector."

Bennett said: "As a firm we have real strength and depth in the building society market, acting for Portman on their merger with Nationwide last year, and for the Catholic Building Society on their proposed merger with Chelsea Building Society announced in June this year. The size of these two transactions and benefits they currently bring to all of the members concerned make them particularly significant."

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