By Matthew Brown Nov. 24 (Bloomberg) -- Investors should buy the euro today on speculation that capital will need to be repatriated to support German bank WestLB AG, according to BNP Paribas SA. The German Finance Ministry said it’s “in talks” with state-owned lender WestLB about a rescue. The bank’s owners, which have different opinions about how WestLB should be helped, have until Nov. 30 to come to a conclusion, Finance Ministry spokesman Michael Offer said in a telephone interview. “The threat of a major shareholder letting WestLB go bust is euro positive,” Hans-Guenter Redeker, head of global foreign-exchange strategy in London at BNP Paribas, said in a telephone interview. “North Rhine-Westphalia will not let it go bust a few months before it’s May election, so balance sheets will be cut and euros repatriated so they can inject capital.” Two German regional savings bank groups that hold a majority stake in WestLB are prepared to let the Dusseldorf- based lender become insolvent, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reported, citing an unidentified banking industry person. The prospect of insolvency may force state-owned banks and savings banks outside North Rhine-Westphalia, WestLB’s home state, to contribute to capital injections, the newspaper said. WestLB needs as much as 5 billion euros ($7.5 billion) in capital and may be shut by Nov. 30 unless a solution for its capital needs can be found, the newspaper said. The euro fell 0.3 percent to $1.4919 as of 8:54 a.m. in London.

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