"If you see Sid, tell him!" A generation will remember this advertising slogan, and the ubiquitous TV advert, from Margaret Thatcher's government's sell-off of British Gas shares in the 1986 privatisation.
The current Conservative prime minister has sought to replicate the word-of-mouth success of that campaign with a policy to sell discounted shares in bailed-out lender Lloyds Banking (LLOY), if elected for a second term.
Labour claimed it was a recycled policy carted out in the hope of a headline. The chancellor had already made clear in the Budget his plans to sell within the year at least £9bn of the government's £12bn - or 22 per cent - stake in the bank.
But potential shareholders will be keen to see the details. Of the planned disposal, £4bn is to be offered to small investors putting in between £250 and £10,000, at a discount of at least 5 per cent to the share price. Those smaller investors who hold on to shares will be rewarded with one share for every 10 owned for a year. The rest will go to institutional investors.
The government is likely to have an easier time selling its Lloyds shares than those in the failed giant Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), where shares are trading £1 below what is seen as the government's break-even price. No ruling party is going to be in a rush to tell Sid about that.
