September 2020: Mps and Popolare di Bari together to create a very strong banking center in the South. Carla Ruocco, president of the parliamentary commission of inquiry on the banking system, 5 Stelle, suggests a scheme aimed at facilitating the exit of the state from the Sienese institute. And here Ruocco quoted the Banca Popolare di Bari to create a bank with a strong presence in the south.
In general, the M5S said it was in favor of a merger of three Mps-Carige-Popolare Bari, two other banks in difficulty and already saved with taxpayer money, with the official support of Laura Castelli, pentastellato Deputy Minister of Economy of the Conte government and of the Draghi government.
September 2021, one year later: in view of the by-elections in Siena next 3-4 October, which see the secretary of the Democratic Party Enrico Letta running for the seat that belonged to Pier Carlo Padoan, now president of UniCredit, the leader of the Lega Matteo Salvini seems to brush up on that solution of the Five stars, which was later expanded by the general secretary of FABI Lando Maria Sileoni.
In an interview with La Repubblica Sileoni had invited us to reflect on the possible birth of a credit pole consisting of Monte dei Paschi di Siena, Carige and Popolare di BariAlso at the end of 2020
And this idea seems to appeal to Salvini, who already launched the proposal for the third banking hub a few days ago, opposing the solution Mps-UniCredit.
“Politics must look ahead with a system vision. The sacrosanct public resources spent to save MPS should not be understood as a sort of disguised social safety net, but as an investment for the future, to create a banking center with a strong territorial vocation, with the aggregation of the healthy assets of other institutions such as Carige, Banca Popolare di Bari, Bper. This operation would cost the State much less than the sale of Mps to Unicredit and would create a banking center dedicated to the real economy ”.
So, all together passionately, Bper included, at a time when the government is thinking, according to some sources, of solutions that perhaps go beyond those that see UniCredit as a protagonist.
Mps-UniCredit: picture complicated by political pressure
“To further complicate the picture there are political pressures – wrote La Stampa yesterday – Letta, who last Thursday met the delegates of the Fiba-Cisl of Mps, reiterated several times that the Unicredit option should not be pursued” at all costs”. On the other side, the League, which with Salvini has returned to talk about a great “national bank” that brings together under the public hat Bari, Carige and Mps“.
La Stampa also spoke of a Treasury that it would be working for create a plan B for the bank“. And of all those rumors that come back to make the various market operators struggling as they look to the future of the Sienese bank. While Giuseppe Castagna, head of Banco BPM, silences the sirens of the banking risk at least for now – by clearly rejecting the Mps and Carige options – rumors about possible M&A transactions are never lacking. Indiscretions that are recycled, given that in some cases they had already circulated in the past.
“In the last few days among the possible interested in a stew from the Monte Bper came forward, which could take charge of 100/150 branches in the North and in Emilia that might prove too much for Unicredit in terms of Antitrust. But it could also contribute to an alternative system, a hypothesis examined and then set aside by the Treasury in recent months. In financial circles it has also circulated, in recent weeks, the indiscretion of ongoing assessments by Generali. Indiscretions that have not found confirmation, also in light of the complex relationships between the shareholders and unlikely and of the ongoing game on the governance of the Lion that make it unlikely that the Lion will be involved in a complex operation such as an acquisition, even partial, of Mps “.
In short, while the State, the largest shareholder of Monte di Stato with a 64% stake, deals with Andrea Orcel, CEO of UniCredit, in the hope of getting rid of those stakes with which it took control of the Sienese bank in 2017, as part of the precautionary recapitalization granted by Brussels not without the affixing of certain conditions, we go back to talking about plan B for Siena, confirming how the negotiations with Piazza Gae Aulenti are not going as smoothly as oil.
Mps, watch out for bonds. And there is also ‘blemish’ profitability per employee ‘
All this uncertainty non did well to the subordinated securities issued by Mps, which yesterday suffered a real slip, coming to yield, as La Stampa always reports, up to -6%, and up to -17% in five days.
Among other things, news continues to circulate on MPS that are more of regression than progress. Like those, reported again from La Stampa, on the bank’s profitability per employee:
“In Siena, on average, 15 employees work per branch, 5 more than in Bper and Credem, 2 more than at Banco Bpm. What matters, however, is the profitability per employee. Intesa Sanpaolo employs 18 per branch. Many, it will be said: but, also by virtue of its product factories, each brings home average margins, in the first six months of 2021, for 141 thousand euros. Banco Bpm reaches 114 thousand, Credem at 103 thousand, Bper at 88 thousand. Mps is at the bottom with 73,000 euros per employee. A negative record that would hardly satisfy any private shareholder “.