Royal Bank of Scotland is close to naming Bank of America as a corporate broker, a move that would see the US lender tasked with helping kickstart one of the largest privatisations in UK history, according to people familiar with the matter.

On Wednesday night UK Chancellor George Osborne announced that the government would start selling down its 79% stake in RBS. The UK government's stake is currently worth just over £32 billion, well under the £45.5 billion that taxpayers injected into the lender at the height of the crisis.