Norway's biggest bank to boost market positions in Sweden by swallowing troubled investment bank, an inside source say.

• Deal to sell HQ Bank ‘is close’
• Carnegie stopped from saving Sweden's HQ Bank

DnB Nor, Norway's largest financial services group, is close to be the new owner of Swedish investment bank HQ Bank, which has been forced into involuntary liquidation after financial authorities revoked its licences, the Dagens Nyheter newspaper said Wednesday, quoting unnamed inside sources.

"DnB Nor is prepared to take over HQ. It's mostly paperwork left now. Throughout the night we sat and worked with the deal" the insider told the newspaper.

A press conference will be held on Thursday to present the details of an agreement, the liquidator for Swedish investment bank said in a statement late Wednesday. Earlier the same day he said that a deal to sell the bank is within reach.

"I consider that an agreement for HQ Bank is close," lawyer Bjorn Riese said in a statement, adding that negotiations would take place Wednesday.

Business daily Dagens Industry (DI) reported Monday that many banks, including Nordea, Handelsbanken, SEB and Norway's DnB NOR, and investment funds like ABG Sundal Collier took part in last-ditch take-over talks late Sunday aimed at saving HQ Bank from liquidation.

But the paper said troubled investment bank Carnegie, which itself was taken over by Sweden's National Debt Office in late 2008 after authorities threatened to withdraw its operating licence, was the only contender to have a ready takeover proposal to acquire HQ Bank. But the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority stepped in to stop the deal, the newspaper reported.