VIOLA (MPS) HOPES FOR A NEW MEMBER. THE TITLE CRUINS
MUSSARI IN THE PROSECUTOR. THE ADVOCATE: "FOR NOW WE ARE SILENT"
”We hope that the conditions will be created in the short term for an interest from stable and quality financial shareholders in the bank'. But at the moment there are no new shareholders ready to invest”. While the CEO of Monte Paschi, Fabrizio Viola, pronounced these words on Radio 24's Salvadanaio in the morning, the share of the Sienese bank dropped in Piazza Affari to 0,2208 (-4,8%) completely canceling the results of the rally beginning of the year, before the sting on derivatives and the explosion of the political case eliminated the benefits of postponing Basel 3. Stuff from a month ago, but it really seems like a century ago. Under the ax of the investigations and the offensive unleashed after the concession of the Monti bonds, Viola himself must acknowledge that "the market still does not believe in what the improvement of the fundamentals implicit in the industrial plan could be".
“An understandable thing, adds Viola, given the particular moment we are experiencing. The position of the president and mine is that the conditions are created in the short term for an interest from stable and quality financial shareholders in the bank". New shareholders, ready to respond to the capital increase of one billion with renunciation of option rights " which presupposes that this increase is presumably subscribed by shareholders not currently present in the bank's capital", concluded Viola.
If only a matter of distrust of the Rocca Salimbeni turnaround. The crisis of confidence, fueled by broadsides from the centre-right, has now affected the entire Italian credit sector. Even greater losses of Mps are accused by Unicredit while a patrol of values of the caliber of Mediobanca, Ubi, Banco Popolare, accuse a drop of 4 percent and more.
It is in this context that Giuseppe Mussari, former president of Mps but also of Abi, entered the prosecutor's office at 15 pm for an interrogation that does not promise sensational news from what the defender, the lawyer Fabio Pisillo, anticipated: "Former president Giuseppe Mussari declared it last Thursday - he said - and we continue on the same line which is that of silence". The defensive thesis, moreover, is already known: the bank and the finance area were two very separate realities. Mussari is ready to answer for the choices and mistakes of the first (starting from the price paid for Antonveneta), he unloads the responsibility of the second on the general manager Antonio Vigni and on the head of the finance area Gianluca Baldassari. At this stage, however, Mussari has decided not to speak before the prosecution reveals his papers.
Antonio Rizzo, former Dresdner Bank, spoke instead during the deposition to the currency police nucleus in Rome, who already in 2008 in front of the prosecutors in Milan allegedly spoke of the '5% gang', referring to some MPS officials. The proof is in some tapes recorded in the possession of Rizzo, the Dresdner Bank official who allegedly spoke of bribes, precisely 5%, within the Sienese bank on the affairs managed by Mps.
In the meantime, the Trani public prosecutor's office has forwarded the investigation file opened on MPS to the Siena prosecutors after Adusbef's complaint. The investigation alleged the crimes of market manipulation, market manipulation and omitted control in relation to alleged inefficiencies in the controls of Consob and Bank of Italy. Prosecutors from Trani Antonio Savasta and Michele Ruggiero continue to investigate for aggravated fraud and usury in relation to derivatives issued by MPS and BNL, Unicredit, Intesa San Paolo and Credem.
But the spotlights, awaiting news from the Sienese Public Prosecutor's Office, remain on Piazza Affari, where the stock remains nailed to 0,2208 (-3,89%). Better than Unicredit -5,74%, as usual the favorite target of international investors. But that's cold consolation.
