The last Borsa session before Christmas ended in the red. There will be no fiscal cliff deal under the tree. And uncertainty leaves the field to profit taking. Milan loses 0,40% with low volumes and the spread closes at 308 basis points, while Monti could resign as early as this evening ("But it's not the Mayas' fault", he says), the spread closes at 308 basis points. Frankfurt -0,38%, Paris -0,21%, London -0,30%. Athens positive +1,84%. The euro against the dollar retraces to 1,3172 (-0,54%). WTI oil rose by 1,83% to 89,51 dollars a barrel.
Wall Street leads the declines: at the end of Europe the Dow Jones lost 1,16% and the Nasdaq 1,46%. The data on confidence from the University of Michigan doesn't help: the index dropped to 72,9 points from 74,5 against expectations for a rise to 75 points. Naike climbs 4,9% driven by revenues up 17%. After S&P cuts Cyprus' rating from B to CCC+, the case will end up on the Eurogroup table in January. President Jean-Claude Juncker has said he does not envisage a haircut on Cyprus' debt, as it is only applicable in exceptional cases. Finally, the number one of the Eurogroup underlined that the end of the crisis is not yet in sight, that we must not slow down the pace of reforms and keep efforts in place to overcome the situation. Today the European Commission has released the data on public aid to banks in the last 3 years: between 2008 and 2011 European banks received 1.616 billion euro of public aid, equal to 12,8% of EU GDP. Most (67%) are guarantees (almost 1.085 billion). The main beneficiaries were the banks of Great Britain (19%), Ireland and Germany (both 16%), which alone account for around 60% of the aid awarded.
In Piazza Affari the reductions are led by the banking sector: Banco Popolare -2,68%, Bper -2,09%, Unicredit -2,05%, Bpm -2,05%, Mps -1,75%.
After the ECB's straight leg entry into the Monti Bond issue, MPS CEO Fabrizio Viola confirmed "the commitment to recreate as quickly as possible the economic conditions that allow interest to be repaid in cash" on the Monti bonds. Generals +0,51%. Isvap announced that in the first half of 2012 the total net profit achieved by insurance companies was equal to 3,02 billion euro, a significant increase compared to the 936 million euro of the first half of 2011 and with a clear trend reversal compared to the loss of 3,6 billion in the whole of 2011 thanks to the "favorable performance of financial management and the significant improvement in the technical management of the non-life classes". However, the Unipol-Fonsai galaxy was down following the confirmation of the share swap for the merger into Grande Unipol: Unipol -0,79%, Fondiaria -3,23%, Premafin -3,70%, Milano Assicurazioni -5,67% on which Banca Akros analysts lowered the rating to accumulated from buy and confirmed the target price of 0,41 euro.
RCS -1,13%. Today the financier Proto delivered to Consob the offer sent to Diego Della Valle for the purchase of the entire Rcs package in his possession, 8,7% of the capital. Proto has formulated a purchase offer of 3 euros per share valid for one month.
In evidence on the Ftse Mib instead Impregilo +2,46%, Prysmian +1,55%, A2A +0,82%, Tenaris +0,77%, Saipem +0,76%.
