Foreign banks in Italy focus on households and businesses but not on the public. This is indicated by the data of the Italian Association of Foreign Banks which for 2011 report a 10% increase in loans to households and a market share rising to 19,6% from 18,6%, +4% of loans to companies (and market share stable at 12,6%) while the exposure of the public administration decreased by 20%. A two-speed sentiment – commented Guido Rosa, president of Aibe: the loans granted to the private system remain and grow, but trust in everything that is public decreases”. The discouragement towards the public stems from the observation that the Italian system is unable to change.
The data on mortgages is significant: in fact, the share of foreign loans in the segment is growing also due to the tensions on funding which impacted above all on Italian banks. The share of international institutions on new mortgage disbursements has risen to 28%.
Overall, foreign institutions increased their loans in Italy by 3% against the 0,7% of the national average, thus bringing their market share on total loans to 16,3% from 16,1%. On the contrary, at the end of 2011 the share of public debt held by foreign investors fell to 40% from 47% in June 2011. According to Fitch, the contraction continued and reached 32% at the end of March. Excluding from this calculation the direct investments made by the parent companies of the foreign banks and by institutions not present in Italy, Aibe notes that the share of government bonds held by branches increased from 17,2% in 2010 to 8,5% % in March 2012. However, it should be noted that the activity of foreign entities in the wholesale trading of public debt remains very significant: in the cash segment of the MTS, the "foreign" share was equal to 86%.
