Week of meetings for Italian banks. After intense Thursday of Unicredit and Mps, on Friday 12 April it's Ubi Banca's turn, which confirms that it is aiming for profit growth in 2019: "We in the market have said that we believe we can make a better profit in 2019 than in 2018 and I confirm this line at this meeting" , he made his debut in front of the audience of shareholders the managing director of Ubi Banca, Victor Massiah. The manager then reiterated the assessments that led the bank to announce the drafting of a new business plan after the change of governance and the installation of the new board of directors: "With the new board we will have to go and write a new business plan because of different situations: for a series of reasons of internal and external contingency, GDP will grow less than expected in the plan, rates are expected to be negative until at least the end of 2020, the spread was expected to be below 150 basis points".
“We have to somehow – continued Massiah – go and rewrite the plan on the basis of the new scenario but also because we did earlier than expected on the things we could control: on operating expenses we have already reached the end-of-plan target, as well as on derisking". Ubi will therefore go to rewrite the new plan with much more ambitious objectives on costs and credit quality "and with a different way of looking for revenues in a still particularly hostile interest rate scenario for a commercial bank". The manager made no secret of that one of the drivers of the next plan will be IWBank, the bank of the group specialized in investment management: “A promising creature, there will be a particular focus dedicated to its growth. We have a little treasure at home." Among other things, numerous shareholders expressed satisfaction with the recent one acquittal sentence for the Iw Bank itself and the former top management and manager in the proceeding for obstacle to the Supervisory activity.
Massiah then claimed what has been done since the creation of Ubi Banca to date: the institute created value for 1,9 billion, going from 2007 tangible shareholders' equity of 5,2 billion to the current one of 7 billion, considering the capital increases from 1,6 billion made in the period and the dividends distributed, equal to 1,7 billion. “Ubi is one of the few banks to have created value during the crisis, in the worst crisis of the last 100 years with a difficult context and an increasingly heavy regulatory context", underlined Massiah, who then reserved a dig at those who have criticized management in recent years: "We have significant room for improvement , we have to improve everything but the only thing that cannot be said is that we have not created value. It has been difficult at times to work with the attacks and falsehoods that have come our way, but these are the numbers, the rest is talk,” he concluded.
As regards possible aggregations, the president of the Cr Cuneo Foundation (which is the first single shareholder of Ubi Banca), Giandomenico Genta, regarding the bank's possible participation in further consolidation of the banking sector: "We hope that the same attitude of prudence and objective assessment of opportunities will be maintained and that only steps capable of creating value for the bank will be taken, the territory and shareholders. However, we do not want to play a conservative role”.
In addition to approving the accounts and deciding on the dividend, the shareholders' meeting is also called to express its opinion on the renewal of the board of directors. The only list presented for the election of the new board of directors will lead to the confirmation of the CEO, Victor Massiah, and to the indication of Letizia Moratti, chairman of the management board until yesterday, as chairman. While the new entry Roberto Nicastro will be vice president. With the work of the shareholders' meeting still in progress, the Ubi Banca share travels in positive territory in Piazza Affari, where around 12.30 it gained 0,85% to 2,597 euros per share.
