In its seventh and final annual report from President of Consob, Paolo Savona speaks freely and, without sparing criticism, addresses some of the hottest topics of recent months. From bank risk, which requires constant investigative activity, according to the rules of the golden power which, according to him, have now become "multi-purpose", passing through the capital law and le criptovalute, which could become the new subprime, creating a financial crisis similar to that of 2008. During his long speech, the number one of the supervisory authority gets more than one thing off his chest, such as when he reveals the difficult relationship with the ECB in relation to the powers of supervision over bank takeover bids which generates “nascent uncertainties”.
Savona on the banking risk: "Constant investigative activity, 52 reports or requests for clarification"
On bank takeovers, “we are not silent,” reassures Consob number one Paolo Savona in his annual Speech to the market. “Since the second half of 2024,” that is, since the banking risk exploded, “a significant part of the banking and financial system has taken important initiatives, starting 6 public offers of purchase and/or exchange which, beyond the usual work required in implementation of the current regulations, have generated 52 complaints or requests for clarification by the same parties involved to resolve disputes arising from the absence of prior agreements between the parties, a condition which is not necessary in the spirit of contestability typical of the competitive market economy", said Savona.
“As the authority guaranteeing transparency – he continued – Consob has carried out a constant investigative activity on every aspect raised by the operations and the complaints, resorting 63 times to the powers of inquiry permitted by Article 115 of the Consolidated Law on Finance, the results of which remain confidential, and 9 times to Article 114, which requires companies to provide the market with timely and complete information on the positions expressed in public declarations or in their insufficient press releases”.
Savona: “On the risk dialogue with the EU is difficult”
“Since the process of implementing public offers” launched as part of the consolidation of the banking sector “also involves decisions by the ECB, they are Difficulties in dialogue arise that they raised uncertainties arising from response times, despite Consob having signed a memorandum of understanding that commits to exchange information without the need for specific formal requests', revealed the president of Consob. "These market initiatives make frequent use of the exchange between stocks, the ratio of which depends on the trends in market prices, particularly important due to the presence of international investors who base their choices on them", he continued.
Savona on golden power: “From extra-ordinary to multi-purpose regulation”
“The multiplicity of rules approved to regulate virtual instruments and protect European economies from abroad, at a time of crisis in cooperation in international relations, entails a increasing difficulty in reconciling the measures among themselves. In particular, the interaction between the rules of the market and corporate game established by the Consolidated Law on Finance and the rules on golden power presents aspects that need to be refined and coordinated with the rules of the European treaties,” Savona said at the Authority's annual meeting with the financial market.
“The relationship between the objectives of state security, free competition and international projection of the economy is atEurope's attention too – he stressed – where today the revision of the Regulation is being discussed on how to assess a strengthened and harmonized mechanism (screening) to prevent and address security risks arising from foreign direct and indirect investments”.
In this context, in Italy there is an increase in requests for such interventions addressed to the Government, addressing the uncertainties of the application of a legislation officially introduced as extra-ordinem, which has become multi-purpose, under the pressure of the new geopolitical phase of a decline in dialogue between States', declared the president of Consob referring to the golden power instrument.
Savona on Capital Law: on the board of directors' list "recourse to higher state bodies"
Delays in the launch of secondary legislation on Capital Law, which is up to Consob, are linked to interpretative doubts on the vote in the assembly for the list of the board of directors, underlined the president of the Authority of via Martini who, in his speech, recalled that during the second consultation with the market "there were raised objections on the interpretation given by Consob to the extension of the delegation for the presentation and voting of the lists for the appointment of the boards of directors, which required a dutiful appeal to higher state bodies, to protect the same operators who will make use of the discipline, inevitably delaying the launch of the provisions".
Savona: “Interpretative dilemmas on Euronext”
Another step, another pebble. In the annual speech of the president of Consob to the market, there is also the Euronext affair, the company that manages the major European financial markets and in whose capital is present Cassa Depositi e Prestiti, which is why a few months ago Forza Italia members raised risks relating to a possible transfer of power and competences towards Paris.
The debate on the placement of the Italian Stock Exchange in the context of the Euronext Group “poses problemsi”, whose origin “can also be found in the agreements reached with the Government in office at the time, which he did not make it clear whether the management of the seven stock exchanges that make up the Dutch holding company allows the group's management to follow a purely allocative logic of a strictly economic nature or whether the independent protection of the interests of each national stock exchange is required to create a market that maintains, as some require, savings in the territory in which they are formed", highlighted the number one of Consob.
“To this end, supervision of Euronext has been entrusted to a College of Regulators composed of the seven national Consobs which, although aware of the existence of local rules and practices in competition with each other, does not have the power to solve dilemmas interpretative questions that arise,” he explained.
According to Savona, "it is therefore required a joint political commitment between states indirectly present in the shareholding, possibly framed in the process for the creation of the European Capital Markets Union and for the even more ambitious launch of the European Savings and Investment Union, essential to complete the single market of goods with their own currency”.
“These worthy initiatives are struggling to take off due to the strenuous defense of regulatory and institutional diversity that afflict the EU and prevent a connection between the abundance of savings and a use aimed at the recovery of investments", underlined the president of Consob.
Cryptocurrencies Risk 2008-Like Crisis
And then the direct attack on cryptocurrencies. “The most recent turbulence was contributed to by the movement of cryptocurrency telluric fault underlying the traditional monetary and financial territory, with possible outlets of unfathomable proportions; the risk has re-emerged under the pressure of theillusion of easy gains so well described by Carlo Collodi in Pinocchio's “Field of Miracles” and has found nourishment in the success achieved by those who have exploited the opportunity offered by the development of information technology”.
Analyzing the phenomenon, "one cannot fail to notice the analogy that is being established with the roots of the 2008 financial crisis due to the spread of complex derivatives that contained credits that were difficult to repay (subprime) and caused serious economic consequences, also putting the security of the State at risk", Savona noted in his latest speech to the market.
The US Administration's Action on Cryptocurrencies and Tariffs “It also alters the functioning of the foreign exchange market, a prelude to the return of their systematic manipulation by the States, further distancing the global economy from a competitive market condition”, continued Savona, recalling Trump's executive orders on cryptocurrencies which “prohibit the birth of the digital dollar and nominate Bitcoin and four other 'virtual' currencies to play the role of international reserve of the US currency, placing the United States at the world's operational center of virtual instruments”.
The US orientation, “is only the latest act of a legitimization of cryptocurrencies that has taken place over time in various ways,” added Savona, according to whom “it has been authoritatively admitted that this recognition creates an upheaval of the monetary system international which, with the tariff increases announced by the United States, also alters the functioning of the foreign exchange market".
From all this, an opportunity could also arise for the European Union: cryptocurrencies “undermine the existing system centered on the international use of the United States dollar, without outlining another equally advantageous, controllable and therefore stabilizable one”, noted the president of Consob, according to whom, “since the leading countries of the world do not appear willing to jointly address the problem, the European Union should provide for it, also because it has the conditions for collecting the inheritance of Keynes' proposal at Bretton Woods and transform the euro in a currency as good as gold to counter the identification between gold and cryptocurrencies”.
