The new bank will be called Abanka and it will be headquartered in Ljubljana, where Abanka's has its corporate headquarters.

The merger has already been cleared by the banks' formal shareholder, the Slovenian Sovereign Holding (SSH), and the Competition Protection Agency.

The new bank will have a market share by assets of about 12%. It plans to focus on retail banking and SMEs.

Under an EU state aid decision clearing the state-sponsored bailout of both banks, the merged bank needs to be privatised by mid-2019.