Leonardo Del Vecchio returns to his office at Mediobanca and, according to what "la Repubblica" asserts today, in the last few hours he would have asked the ECB, through the Bank of Italy, for authorization to purchase new shares and to rise from the current 9,9, 20% up to XNUMX% of the Milanese institute of Piazzetta Cuccia, led by Alberto Nagel. Del Vecchio rules out aggressive intentions but his has all the air of a climb that promises sparks even on the stock market and that can change the balance of Italian finance.
Del Vecchio, who in the Forbes ranking is the richest entrepreneur in Italy, is already today the first shareholder of Mediobanca, but he is not satisfied because his project is to build an Italian finance hub by making better use of the bank's potential business, that holds the jewel of 13% of Generali in its portfolio, and blocking the Lion of Trieste with other partners against the aims of foreign groups.
Del Vecchio, who is 85 years old and has a successful career as an entrepreneur behind him with the creation of Luxottica, which was later merged into Essilor – which is worth 56,6 billion euros on the Paigi Stock Exchange -, entered Mediobanca last autumn somewhat surprisingly, claiming that he wants to diversify his investments and to find a suitable allocation to his abundant liquidity. But, while excluding hostile intentions towards the current management of Mediobanca, it was immediately understood that his would not be a passive investment, but only the first stage of a more ambitious plan aimed at the creation of a large Italian finance hub.
Now the time seems to have come, even if it will be necessary to see if the European Central Bank will give the go-ahead for the passage of the main Italian bank from the status of public company to a bank 20% owned by a single shareholder, who has done other things in life and who is an entrepreneur and not a banker. However times are good, because the Coronavirus effect has hitherto heavily penalized bank stocks and since February Mediobanca has lost 40% of its stock market value. Whoever buys now buys Mediobanca at a discount and Del Vecchio expects to do so, also because, by buying the shares of the Milanese bank, he also buys a large share of Generali at discounted prices.
In the next few hours, at the latest in the next few days, it will be understood whether Del Vecchio's takeover can go through, but what is certain is that a period of great effervescence is about to open on Mediobanca and on Piazza Affari, from which other banking and insurance stocks will also benefit from contamination, considering that the order of the day is always the Ops by Intesa Sanpaolo on Ubi. Two operations – Mediobanca and Sanpaolo/Ubi – which, if successful, could change the face of Italian finance which could also re-appropriate itself through the CDP of Borsa Italiana spa, if the British of the London Stock Exchange are forced by the Antitrust to sell it.
