Unicredit is considering new acquisitions in central and eastern Europe. The CEO of Unicredit Andrea Orcell chooses the stage of German Faz (the online version of the Frankfurter Allgemeine) to indicate, in a long interview, the future strategies of Piazza Gae Aulenti. “An acquisition could help us ensure that the market recognizes our full value, which is not the case today,” the CEO said. We want to be a leading player in Europe. We will only act if the conditions are right. Some banks don't want to do business. Others have highly inflated prices. So we stay away from it, we are disciplined." But Orcel is confident: “it is likely that we will make some acquisitions in the coming years, especially in Central and Eastern Europe.”
For HVB the legal form changes and becomes a limited liability company
The German audience's opportunity is also to explain a detail that may seem formal but which, as always, has essential implications. Orcel explains that hvb, Unicredit's main subsidiary in Northern Europe will change its corporate form. The bank bought in 2005 by the then CEO, Alessandro Profumo, will abandon the legal form of an AG (Aktiengesellschaft) to become a GmbH (Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung). According to Italian company law this is a transition by the joint-stock company to the limited liability company, a form rarely used for banks, especially large ones. No large German credit institution, for example, is organized in these terms and for this reason the news was greeted by some controversy in Munich, where someone interpreted the choice of Piazza Gae Aulenti as a weakening of HVB.
The CEO, Andrea Orcel, explained his goal “With the GmbH processes become more transparent and faster”. Not only. According to the law on AG, today the management of Hbv would be obliged to act first and foremost in the interests of the institute and not of the group. “From a legal point of view, the interests of the group must come second. We cannot accept it,” explained the banker. Today, every time Unicredit adopts a group vision, which the bank almost always has to do, the German management gets into trouble because it should give priority to the interests of the German AG, explained Orcel. Now the situation will change. “Hvb – Orcel always said – will have the same approach to operations as all our banks, including the Italian ones”. However, the HVB brand will not be questioned: “The Unicredit group was created through several acquisitions over the years and these acquisitions were linked to the brands, even in Italy. We have a strong brand, but at the moment there is no such plan,” Orcel explained to Faz.
What could result from the HVB operation
Some observers hypothesize that the new HVB structure could be more favorable to an M&A operation in Germany: after all, Orcel had examined the Commerzbank dossier since his first year in office. Unicredit has 10 billion in excess capital, a strong share and a top management ready to face the international challenge.
Confidence in the German economy
The banker also expressed his opinion in favor ofGerman economy, although tested today by the real estate crisis and the threat of a recession. “Germany is not the sick man of Europe. The country is facing the biggest challenge since the Second World War, because the ecological transformation and at the same time industrial realignment must succeed without Russian gas and with fewer exports to China. But I think people know what they need to do. The economy stay strong, the government has quite broad shoulders and can count on better financing conditions than any other country in the world,” concluded the banker in the interview.
