* ING looking to sell Asia, Switzerland private bank ops
* Julius Baer a "serious" contender
* Assets could be sold together or in pieces (Adds background on ING sale plans throughout)
By Saeed Azhar and Ben Berkowitz
SINGAPORE/AMSTERDAM, Aug 7 (Reuters) - ING may finalise the sale of its private banking units in Asia and Switzerland by September, with Julius Baer emerging as a strong contender, sources with knowledge of the deal said.
Final bids are due in the next few weeks after at least six parties submitted non-indicative bids for these assets, which may fetch over $1 billion, sources familiar with the discussion told Reuters.
Barclays was also among the companies that had looked at ING's private banking units, and HSBC and Standard Chartered were also linked with them, but they are no longer in the hunt, sources told Reuters.
"A number of bidders have looked at ING private bank," one of the sources said, adding Julius Baer is a "serious" contender. Already well capitalized with a 16.7 percent Tier 1 ratio, Julius Baer has said it is on the lookout for acquisitions
JPMorgan is advising ING on the sale, sources said.
ING, Julius Baer, Barclays, HSBC and Standard Chartered all declined to comment.
ING's asset sale comes at a very difficult time for the bank, after it was badly hit by the global credit crisis, which forced it into a loss in 2008 and led to the Dutch government to inject 10 billion euros ($14.36 billion) into the bank.
Valuations for private banking assets have also come down significantly after the last major boom for markets ended in 2007.
The world's rich lost a fifth of their wealth in 2008 and the number of people with fortunes of more than $1 million fell 15 percent as the financial crisis wiped out two years of growth, the 13th annual Merrill Lynch/Capgemini World Wealth Report released in June said.
"Taking over a private bank in this sort of a market is a challenge," said an executive at a Western private bank who is aware if the sale. "The speed that ING is showing to sell these assets will not necessarily be the speed that buyers will show," he said.
Sources familiar with the discussions said ING is also looking at the possibility of selling its Asian operation, which runs out of Singapore, and Swiss unit separately to extract a higher price. ING has said repeatedly its Benelux operations are core to its future and are not on the table.
If the operations are sold separately a number of Asian banks such as ANZ and DBS Group may be interested, banking sources said. DBS officials declined to comment on Friday.
ING Private Banking made a loss of 12 million euros in the fourth quarter of 2008 due to loan loss provisions at Private Banking Asia, the bank said in February.
ING announced in November the sale of its private banking operations in Curacao to Dutch private bank Van Lanschot to focus its operations on Europe and Asia. The unit managed 500 million euros of assets. (Reporting by Saeed Azhar in SINGAPORE, Ben Berkowitz in AMSTERDAM, Steve Slater in LONDON and Lisa Jucca in ZURICH; Editing by David Cowell and Rupert Winchester)