The countdown for is starting with a downward trend the Mediobanca/Del Vecchio affair. Both the shares of Piazzetta Cuccia and Generali, the true object of desire of the owner of Luxottica/Essilor, travel in negative territory, both down by about 1,3% exactly one week from the final date for the ECB's decision on the request for Del Vecchio to rise from the current 10 to 20% of the Milanese investment bank.
The market is probably convinced that Frankfurt will not deny the authorization to Delfin (intended to rise initially to 13-14%), which has undertaken to remain a pure financial investor and therefore to do not question the independence of Mediobanca. Not even the August Decree, however, addressed the issue: the content of article 64-bis, which in fact sealed off Mediobanca, was expelled from the text in the version stamped by the Accounting Office. For the moment, therefore, the government has not placed golden power on the institute, weak this morning in line with the rest of the sector grappling with the moratorium on debts to credit companies extended to 31 January 2021.
The calm on the front, however, is only apparent. In fact, Del Vecchio's advance leaves no one indifferent given the entrepreneur's track record, more lively and aggressive than ever despite his 85 years. In particular, the game scheme closely resembles Del Vecchio's advance in Beni Stabili and Fonciére des Regions from which he started Covivio, the large Italian-French real estate company which Del Vecchio controls from Paris. Even then Del Vecchio progressively increased his grip on the two companies until he secured control. The businessman could do an encore in Generali by combining the shareholding in Leone in its possession with that held by Mediobanca.
It is an operation that worries a part of the Italian political establishment that fears a hegemony of Paris: not that DelVecchio, very hard in defending the reasons of Luxottica in front of Essilor, can be considered as a sort of transalpine Fifth Column. But the entrepreneur himself makes no secret of having more faith in French-style governance in view of what he considers yet another great mission: to restore Generali's lost European leadership, which can only be done by bringing together Generali and Axa (in addition to Zurich) to be opposed to the hegemony of Allianz.
Will it go like this? For the moment, Mediobanca's shareholding structures lend themselves to various evolutions: the market has more than 70% of the capital, of which 1/4 retail and the rest institutional; the consultation pact animated by Doris has 12%, to which one can theoretically add the share of Vincent Bolloré and that which is becoming fundamental of Intesa Sanpaolo, without forgetting Unipol. In total, the reference shareholders can exceed or reach 20% against the package in the hands of 10% Del Vecchio. And anyone wishing to ride the speculative wave in the short term by focusing on the Del Vecchio effect could count on solid ground. Title trades at 25% off compared to the sum of the parts. Furthermore, the results of the fourth quarter of 2019 were better than expected and the capital is very solid.
