Fondiaria Sai ever closer to Unipol. And 2012 could bring the longed-for marriage to the Italian insurance sector, which has been devoid of interesting starting points for some time (with the exception of Generali and the large international groups), blocked by the family structures that conditioned its destiny while the banks instead put together a long series of mergers and reorganisations.
But now the crisis, the mountain of debts and Fonsai's urgent needs for fresh capital, which must increase the solvency margins, have forced the Ligresti family, reference shareholder of Fondiaria Sai through the Premafin holding, to take a step back by the insurance company and, perhaps, to give up permanently. In fact, the Ligresti plan that would have involved Matteo Arpe and Carlo Puri Negri to secure control over Premafin as part of the project to recapitalize Fondiaria Sai seems to have vanished.
They have so the hypotheses around a reorganization of the insurance company involving Unipol have regained strength (and Finsoe, the cooperative holding company that controls the Bologna-based group). And this above all because the acceleration of the dossier would have been imprinted by Mediobanca. The Stock Exchange believes in the turning point: after the leaps of the past few days, Fondiaria Sai is up 7% again today Premafin is in the volatility auction with a theoretical double-digit increase (after +83% in the last month on restructuring items). Unipol, on the other hand, is weak, down by 0,34%.
The operation is certainly complex and the contours are not yet clear: on the table is the issue of refinancing the 300 million Premafin debt which could also involve a conversion into shares by the creditor banks and the role that the Clessidra fund could play, available to support Premafin with 200 million euros but which needs greater clarity on the future of the subsidiary Fonsai (an intervention that would not necessarily be excluded from the merger between Fondiaria and Unipol). There are numerous options being discussed, including the entry of Finsoe into Premafin or of Unipol into Premafin through a capital increase. A scenario, that of a union with Fonsai, which in turn the Bolognese company would seem willing to exploit to resolve the thorn in the side of the Bank which has been working on for years but which has never borne the desired results: according to rumors, in fact, the Bologna-based company is aiming to sell Unipol Banca to some institution involved in the rescue as a counterpart to dedicating itself to the rescue of FonSai.
What is certain is that the industrial integration between the Bologna-based company and Fonsai would create a national champion in the insurance field with a Non-Life market superior to that of Generali and which would secure, even from foreign aims, the insurance group and the holdings upstream of Fonsai exposed with the banks. A plan that also for this reason would be appreciated by the creditor banks and in the end also accepted by the Ligresti. Meanwhile, the next appointment for Fondiaria Sai is January 27, when the board of directors will have to decide the amount of the capital increase, which is between 600 and 750 million euros, necessary to improve solvency margins.
