Irish Permanent shareholders are being asked to approve the group's merger with Irish Life next month and will receive details of the deal in the post next week. Irish Permanent is offering 60.85 of its shares for every 100 Irish Life shares. This will give the new entity, Irish Life & Permanent, a notional market value of £3.22 billion (#4.1 billion). In the offer document the Irish Permanent board is recommending shareholders vote in favour of the merger, stating it believes it is in their "best interest".

Shareholders considering the deal are invited to attend an extraordinary general meeting on February 19th where they can raise the merger with the board of directors and cast their vote. The merger has already been well received in the stock markets and shareholders of both companies have made gains on the back of the stronger share price since it was announced. Analysts have been recommending that shareholders in both companies should hold onto their shares with further progress expected in the short term.

In its correspondence with shareholders, Irish Permanent's directors state the new company will maintain a progressive dividend policy and will be based on that currently applied at Irish Life.

Under the terms of the share offer, where fractions of shares arise they will not be issued to Irish Life shareholders. Instead, the new shares representing the aggregate of fractional entitlements will be sold in the market and the net proceeds of their sale distributed on a pro rata basis to Irish Life shareholders, who are entitled to the proceeds.

In an unusual move, the company has decided that where individual shareholder's entitlements are less than £1 this sum will be donated to a charity to be selected by the board of Irish Life & Permanent. It estimates this will amount to around £2,000.