Delfin working on the minority list for the Mediobanca board of directors

Milan — The time is approaching when the list for the renewal of Mediobanca’s board of directors will have to be presented. Work on a list presented by the outgoing board of directors began last February and should see the light in mid-September. In addition to the Board of Directors and the Appointments Committee chaired by Maurizio Costa, with the addition of the lead independent director Angela Gamba, two consultants are also at work, Spencer Stuart for the selection of profiles and Deloitte for drafting the self-assessment and quantitative report. Four directors out of a total of 15 are not eligible for re-election, Costa, Comneno, Carfagna, Magistretti and 12 directors should leave the board list taking into consideration the requirements of independence, competence and gender equality, as recommended by the ECB which supervises everything.

It now seems to have been established that there will be no other majority lists: the relative majority financial shareholder, Delfin – the safe of the Del Vecchio family – has no intention of launching a battle to change the board of directors and management. Nor could it do so since it is not a bank, unless there are difficult balancing acts that would have to be examined by the ECB. At the moment there are ongoing contacts between the board of directors and the top management of Delfin to understand if there could be some grafts in the list of the board that could be appreciated by the shareholder with the 20%.

A name that has been mentioned is certainly that of Vittorio Grilli, former Treasury Minister with the Monti government and now at Jp Morgan, as possible president. But the recent hearing in Parliament of the banker, who took a position not in favor of the institution of the list of the board of directors for the Italian market, and the fact that in the past Grilli, whose competence in financial matters is not discussed, had a relationship of esteem and friendship with Leonardo Del Vecchio, have caused this hypothesis to wan in the bud.

With the month of August still ahead, however, it cannot be excluded that the parties may converge on another prestigious name that meets all the requirements required for the presidency of Mediobanca, position that Renato Pagliaro, banker pupil of Enrico Cuccia and Vincenzo Maranghi, has successfully held since May 2010.

The other route, which at the moment is more feasible, is the presentation of a minority list by Delfin. Mediobanca’s statute provides that if a minority list is presented by Assogestioni (on behalf of the funds), and this is voted by at least 2% of the capital, one representative out of the three reserved for minorities would be entitled. So a Delfin list, which could also be voted on by the Caltagirone shareholder who recently rose to 9.9% of Mediobanca, could be entitled to two directors on the board.