Bank of Ireland has begun a series of meetings with large institutional investors as part of a campaign to force the board of Abbey National to engage in discussions about its takeover approach.

The bank's chief executive, Mr Michael Soden, together with members of his management team, met several Irish institutions yesterday and will meet crucial shareholders in London tomorrow.

The meetings were held just hours after Abbey National once again rejected Bank of Ireland's £10 billion sterling (€16 billion) offer for the company. The former UK building society said it had not changed its mind about the approach and was still convinced that it was better off pursuing its own restructuring plan.

"Considering the announcement by Bank of Ireland, this view has not changed." It added that it would continue to examine the details of the offer and consult its advisers.

This statement followed the disclosure of the full details of Bank of Ireland's approach to Abbey National to the stock markets in Dublin and London yesterday. It has offered shareholders between 90 and 95 new Bank of Ireland shares for every 100 Abbey National shares plus around £1.30 (€2.06) in cash for each Abbey National share.

The offer suggests a price of between £6.78 and £7.08 per share for Abbey National, which translates into a premium of 10-15 per cent to its closing price on Monday.

The stock market reaction to the proposal remained cool with analysts and shareholders dismissing the likelihood that Bank of Ireland's takeover approach would be successful.

Bank of Ireland shares rose in line with other stocks in Dublin yesterday, ending the day at €10.10 up 50 cents.

The bank's share price had slumped sharply on news of the Abbey takeover approach and recovered towards the end of last week as the markets seemed to have written off any prospect of its bid being successful.

In contrast, Abbey National shares continued to rally as investors continued to view it as a takeover target. Its shares closed 67p higher at £6.85, slightly shy of the indicative price offered by Bank of Ireland.

In its statement the Republic's second biggest bank detailed the extent of cost savings and revenue synergies that could materialise from a takeover of Abbey National and stressed that the proposal was subject to completing due diligence.

Bank of Ireland governor Mr Laurence Crowley said he was confident that the bank's management team had the skills and experience to reinvigorate Abbey National's performance and deliver substantial benefits from the combination.

"I am willing to meet again with Lord Burns, Abbey National's chairman, to discuss how we might co-operate to explore this opportunity further," he said yesterday.

The two banks have a large number of common shareholders who represent more than 33 per cent of each of the financial institutions.

Mr Soden will be specifically working to win their support.

One of the biggest shareholders in both banks is the US investment giant Fidelity. Others include Jupiter Asset Management, Merrill Lynch, Standard Life and Credit Suisse Asset Management.

Mr Philip Gibbs, a fund manager at Jupiter, remained very negative about the bid approach. Yesterday he said that Bank of Ireland would be better off buying its own shares, warning that it may find that it becomes the subject of a hostile bid itself.

"The market is saying it would be better for Bank of Ireland if this did not succeed," he said. Mr Joe O'Dwyer, fund manager at Montgomery Oppenheim in Dublin, said Abbey National appeared to have left the way open for Bank of Ireland to come back with another offer.

Abbey yesterday appointed Merrion Capital to gauge investor sentiment in the Republic for the deal.