See Resolution shares See Standard Life shares

The regulator says that Standard Life's statement that it is looking at ways to restructure its offer may have created false demand for Resolution shares.

The Takeover Panel's code says that a firm cannot say that it might improve an offer without actually doing so.

Resolution ditched its support for Standard Life's �4.9bn offer on Monday.

A rival bidder, Pearl Group, bought shares on Friday that take its holding to 24.2% of Resolution, which is enough to block Standard Life's offer.

As a result, Resolution had to announce that it would no longer be able to support the offer in its current form.

But it added that it "continues to see real strategic benefit in the combination of Resolution and Standard Life".

It was then that Standard Life announced that it was looking to restructure the offer, in order to allow it to go ahead with the approval of only 50% of shareholders, instead of the current 75%.

But the Takeover Panel said that Standard Life had confirmed that there could be no certainty that such a restructuring would be possible and that, as a result, it was wrong to raise shareholders' hopes.