The amount of state aid needed to save Ps it may be less than expected, but the discount will not be painless. After the failure of the capital increase in December it was said that, of the 8,8 billion requested by European supervisors to secure Montepaschi, 6,6 would come from public coffers. The comparison of the last few months, however, has revealed that the bill for Italian taxpayers should fall to an amount inclusive between five and six billion.
However, there is a counterpart to pay, and it will be the employees who will do it. The restructuring plan will have to reduce costs much more than previously foreseen by Monte dei Paschi. The Bank had scheduled others to leave 2.600 workers (over 10% of personnel), after the 5 already cut in recent years. But the agreement under discussion between Rome and Brussels will probably lead to a heavier bill: Europe would like it another 5 exits.
Just this morning, sources close to the institute let it be known that 1.300 MPS employees have asked to join the first tranche of voluntary redundancies envisaged by the current business plan.
The first tranche potentially affects the number of employees who accrue pension rights from this year to April 2022 and therefore meet the requirements to access the redundancy fund. The agreement, signed between the company and the unions, provides for the financing of 600 redundancies for the first tranche.
Given that membership has been well above the expected coverage, only workers who meet the requirements by November 2020 will probably be covered. To meet the other requests, another agreement will obviously be needed and also the resources available to finance it. But that will almost certainly not be enough.
In the meantime, a new three-year bond was issued today with a state guarantee, with a coupon of 0,75% and maturing on March 15, 2020 for a nominal amount of 4 billion. The bank has fully subscribed to the issue which will subsequently be sold on the market or used as collateral to guarantee financing transactions.
