Green light to the wedding Tour-BPM – BBC

BANKS

Green light to the wedding Tour-BPM
Born the third group of the country

“Happy is an extraordinary operation.” The two Board decide on the merger: in Verona on 54% of the parent company. Padoan congratulates

VERONA And marriage is. Late in the evening of Wednesday, at the end of a meeting-river held simultaneously – also because of the more complex procedure required by the double board (Milan surveillance and management) -, Banco Popolare and BPM resolved in parallel with the promise of marriage that will bring the two institutions to merge almost even by December of this year, creating the third largest Italian banking group: the Verona shareholders will have 54% of the parent company’s future. Contravention for once to comply with the formalities that distinguishes all the operations in which they are involved listed companies, the president of Banco Popular, Carlo Fratta Pasini, announced the turn off Twitter before it was released the official press release: “Happy to launch operation extraordinary – tweeted – so significant after a competitive process, and in severe market environment. ” And yet, in the series: “The operation, in full compliance with the requirements of the Supervisory Board, shows that our economic system is alive and responsive. There will be significant prospective benefits for the banks concerned and for our local communities. “

He congratulated, by the same means , also Economy Minister Pier Carlo Padoan: “the reforms work, the popular change: bigger, stronger, more transparent.” Helped, during construction, the new blessings come directly from Frankfurt: around four in the afternoon, the agencies have started the news that the European Banking Supervision, which reports to the ECB, had given his “freedom informally “the combination of the two banks, after the same had sent on Tuesday the latest clarification of the operation, concerning ‘capital action” required by the central Bank and the governance of the new institute that will be born after the merger. In equity markets, the titles of the two Wednesday institutions were suspended from trading, a sure sign that the stock market was expecting new determinants in the course of the day.

The attention of analysts was It focused mainly on strengthening measures that have been agreed with the ECB and that will affect most directly the Banco Popolare. There is talk of a move that will be worth one billion euro, including the sale of non-performing loans to almost 600 million, disposals of assets (according to rumors it could be Popolare Verona and Avipop Life Insurance) and issuance of securities to strengthen social capital. The increase, in this case, could take place in restricted and reserved for stable shareholders and institutional investors, among which should play an important role compatriot CariVerona Foundation. The whole operation, to pull the sums, will lead to a substantial strengthening of the Verona popular capital and, therefore, will affect the exchange ratios between the titles of the two banks when the integration is operational.

the two directors of the operation , Pierfrancesco Saviotti (for the Bank) and Giuseppe Castagna (for BPM), have already been on the agenda for Thursday a number of very important events: in the morning the meeting with analysts , which it will be presented the integration project just approved, so the comparison with the trade unions of the respective banks, again for the purpose of illustrating the upcoming merger between the two institutions. It is no secret, in fact, that in the Milan front were their employees, active and retired – which, as is customary in banks, are also for the vast majority shareholders of their institution – to raise as many doubts about wedding plans with Verona. The option in favor of BPM for maintaining autonomy within three years of the new bank, to guarantee and oversee the Lombard branch (strongly supported condition, if not set, just by the powerful Lombard Institute unions), should be reached by resurrecting the banking license of Popolare di Mantova.

Alessandro Zuin