After 17 years the Treasury's NatWest exit is in sight, with no need for a flashy public sell-off

Sometime next spring, HM Treasury should finally sell its last share in NatWest, or the Royal Bank of Scotland as it was.

- Nils Pratley

The process will have taken 17 years. If that feels like an age, it is a shorter timespan than seemed likely only 12 months ago.

At the end of last year, the government's stake—84.9% after the two-stage nationalisation by the last Labour administration in 2008-09—was still 38%. Now it is down to 11.4% after the latest "directed buyback", in which the bank bought shares from the Treasury for cancellation—in this case £1bn-worth.

NatWest probably has scope to fund another £1bn in the same way before spring, but the bulk of the shares will be shifted by straightforward sales in the stock market. It is this steady drip-feed of shares via a trading plan that has quietly made the difference in the past 12 months.