Crucial days for the Italian banks in crisis, but if for Monte dei Paschi the clearing seems to be closer, the road of the two Veneto banks remains uphill and tomorrow they will return to meet their boards of directors to talk again about the precautionary recapitalization and the billion of private capital necessary to definitively remove the specter of the bail-in.
The most urgent dossier concerns the Veneto banks, an increasingly bitter chapter for the bondholders of Popolare Vicenza and Veneto Banca, despite the fact that Minister Pier Carlo Padoan has ruled out the bail-in. ABI statistics show that the bad debts of the system are returning "close to pre-crisis levels: the deterioration rate reached 2,3% at the end of 2016 (it was 3,3% at the end of 2015), falling to the level of 2008 and significantly departing from the negative peak (6%) reached during the recessions of 2009 and 2013”. But it is little consolation, while the hunt for the billion continues which, according to Frankfurt, private individuals will have to pay before the EU gives the go-ahead for the recapitalization of the two institutions. Banca Popolare di Vicenza and Veneto Banca have asked Atlante for a new recapitalization intervention.
Meanwhile, within the week, however, the green light should arrive for the capital increase of Monte dei Paschi, which will end up under the control of the Treasury. Alongside this operation, the securitization of non-performing loans for 27 billion will begin, which will be taken over, at about 20% of the value, by a vehicle participated by Atlante, by Fonspa and by the Fortress fund. The consortium will then be strengthened by the sale of a part of the Npl to Elliott partner (guarantor of the AC Milan purchase operation), while 3,3 billion Gacs, i.e. securities that enjoy the guarantee of the Treasury, will end up on the market.
