Mps sinks on the stock market after the exit of Axa: the title is priceless

MILAN. Just when Monte dei Paschi is about to announce the return from March 20 in the Ftse Mib, that is among the blue chips of Piazza Affari, here is the surprise. Siena’s second shareholder after the Treasury, namely the French insurance company Axa, has decided to sell its shares. Not all, but almost: from the 7.94% it reached by investing 200 million euros on the occasion of the last 2.5 billion capital increase, it drops to a symbolic 0.0007%. At the opening of trading, the stock is priceless and falls by a theoretical 12%.

Institutional investors
The operation takes place through an accelerated private placement (accelerated bookbuilding) entrusted to a French bank, Exane Bnp Paribas, with the task of distributing the share to institutional investors, securities discounted between 10 and 15% compared to the stock exchange values, where yesterday Mps it closed up 2.8% at 2.74 euros. Axa, by selling between 2.33 and 2.47 euros, monetizes a good capital gain: between 33 and 47 million euros. But, in a note, he ensures that the sale “does not impact the partnership with the bank in any way”, i.e. the joint venture on the policies from which, even in the bank’s darkest years, Axa has always earned.

The outstretched hand
For the rest, they ensure from Paris that, after the outstretched hand during the increase, Axa now does not aim to “seek representation on the board of directors”, whose lists must be filed by 26 March. Nor does it want to “influence the bank’s long-term strategy.” And so it sells. However, there are those who see in the sudden move the will to leave the field before an extraordinary operation that could involve Siena, where the Treasury aims to sell the 64.23% achieved with the 2017 bailout. Certainly there is the fact that today, with the prospects improved thanks to the plan carried out by CEO Luigi Lovaglio, selling Siena securities is much easier than during the increase, despite the fact that prices have increased. Among the underwriters of that operation, Axa is not the only one to have already sold.

The Enpam case
Enpam did it a couple of weeks ago, collecting 18 million compared to the 15 invested. «The first to benefit from this operation – President Alberto Oliveti said on the occasion – will be the newborn children of doctors and dentists, given that the aid that the Organization provides for parenting is financed precisely with the proceeds of the asset investments”.