The fog on the horizon of Mps and Carige does not clear. As investors target stocks on the stock market, with shares losing 5% and 6% respectively in the early afternoon, bad news is coming from rating agencies and possible partners.
Standard and Poor's has put Banca Carige on negative credit watch, which currently has a long-term rating of 'B-'. Subordinated debt with a 'CC' rating is also under creditwatch. The decision was taken after the results of the stress tests released by the European Central Bank, which requested a capital strengthening of 814 million euros. The agency instead confirmed the short-term rating at 'C'.
“We will remove Carige from the crediwatch when we have greater clarity on the bank's ability to implement the actions already announced (ie a capital increase of between 500 and 650 million and sale of assets) in the coming months – explained the agency's analysts -. We will also monitor the bank's ability to implement the relaunch process, which began after the change in management".
From Intesa Sanpaolo, on the other hand, comes a "categorical no" to a possible intervention in Monte dei Paschi. This is the position of the institute's managing director, Carlo Messina who, entering the ceremony for Savings Day, clarified: “It is not imaginable in any way. Intesa Sanpaolo has its own business plan and it is the banking stock that has grown the most in the last year”.
Messina then underlined that the growth sectors for Intesa envisaged by the plan concern private banking, asset management and insurance. On the hypothesis of distributing excess capital to shareholders through an extra dividend, the manager recalled that Intesa already has a program for the distribution of ordinary dividends of 10 billion over the four years of the plan and then added that only in 2016 will he evaluate the possible distribution to shareholders of the remaining excess capital.
