Shawbrook, Pollen Street and Co-op Bank declined to comment. BC Partners and Metro Bank could not immediately be reached for comment. Metro Bank has seen its shares tumble after news emerged that it had hired advisers to shore up its balance sheet after failing to gain key capital relief from banking regulators. The bank has been exploring options to raise up to 600 million pounds ($734.28 million) of capital through equity and debt injections and asset sales. Britain's Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) is sounding out buyers over the weekend in hopes of finding a solution for ailing Metro Bank before markets open on Monday morning. For Shawbrook, an acquisition of either Co-op or Metro Bank would give it greater scale as well as access to current deposit accounts, a cheaper source of funding for its loans than savings.