Bad news for the subsidiary of the municipalities of Milan and Brescia A2A. The Court of Justice of the European Union has ruled that A2A will have to return a good 290 million euros to the Italian state. However the Lombard utility specifies that "the sums in question have already been fully returned to the Italian State, burdened with interest calculated according to the compound interest criterion", reads a press release. Therefore, "nothing else is owed by A2A to the Italian State", adds the note, highlighting that there will be no negative impact from today's ruling.
The story starts from afar, even from when A2A was still divided into the Asm of Brescia and the Aem of Milan. In the 90s the two companies managed to obtain tax exemptions and loans at low interest rates but in 2002 the European Commission judged these operations to be state aid against the two companies and thus requested the recovery of the sums.
In 2008, the Italian government also requested the recovery of the aid provided to the two companies, which today form A2A, also requesting composite interest. Therefore, at a certain point in the story, Italy requested that the interest on aid and loans granted in the 90s be added to the capital, thus also becoming interest-bearing. Italy had practically requested to apply theanatocism, i.e. to also obtain the payment of interest on the interest. A2A had immediately contested the basis for calculating the interest before the Italian judges. Having reached the final stage of the proceedings, the Court of Cassation asked the European Court of Justice whether Italian legislation could provide for compound interest with respect to a regulation which was not yet applicable at the date on which the recovery of the aid was ordered by the Commission.
With today's sentence, the European Court of Justice agreed with Italy that in this way, in addition to the 170 million in capital, it will also be able to recover 120 million in compound interest for the tax exemptions and subsidized loans granted in the 90s.
