UniCredit received a high-level rejection from Berlin on Monday 23 September. On her trip to New York, the German Chancellor scathingly condemned the manoeuvres carried out by the Italian bank to buy its competitor Commerzbank. “Hostile attacks and hostile takeovers are not a good thing for banks”said Olaf Scholz at the beginning of the evening.
The German leader was reacting to a new surprise operation orchestrated by the Italian bank a few hours earlier. In a press release, UniCredit announced that it had risen by 11.5%. “through financial instruments” its share capital in Commerzbank, increasing its stake to 21%, subject to “approvals required” by the European Central Bank (ECB).
The move, which would make UniCredit the largest shareholder in Commerzbank, comes just days after its spectacular entry into the capital of the second largest German bank. On 11 September, UniCredit took advantage of Berlin’s sale of a block of its shares in Commerzbank (equivalent to 4.5% of the capital) to acquire a total of 9% of the shares, becoming overnight the second largest shareholder in the group and surprising German politicians.
Maximum pressure
Olaf Scholz’s statement marks a new escalation in the intransigent face-to-face that has been taking place between Berlin and the Italian bank for thirteen days. Andrea Orcel, the president and CEO of UniCredit, was aware of the lack of German enthusiasm for his proposed merger with Commerzbank, which he announced several months ago. Last week he assured the press that he would not pursue the approach without the support of the German government. However, the latter has since multiplied its signs of disapproval. Berlin announced on Friday that it no longer wanted to put new shares in Commerzbank up for sale, in which the State still holds 12% of the capital. On Monday, a spokesman confirmed to the press that he supported the Frankfurt establishment’s independence strategy and had informed UniCredit of this.
This was not enough to discourage the formidable Italian boss, a long-time expert in mergers and acquisitions within the American bank Merrill Lynch. UniCredit said on Monday that it had submitted an application to increase its stake to 29.9% in Commerzbank. With the support of Rome, Andrea Orcel seems to have decided to exert maximum pressure on Olaf Scholz’s government, at a time when Brussels is advocating the strengthening of European financial markets. “UniCredit shares the belief that a strong banking union in Europe is key to the continent’s economic success”, He spent a good deal of time highlighting the Italian bank in his press release, referring to the report on the future of European competitiveness presented at the beginning of September by Mario Draghi. The former Italian governor of the ECB advocates in particular the acceleration of the union of capital markets, in order to mobilise household savings towards private investments in Europe.
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