UniCredit stalls on state aid as profits improve
ITALIAN bank UniCredit said it would decide in September whether to go ahead with Italian state aid after reporting better-than-expected second-quarter net income on improved trading profit.
Chief executive Alessandro Profumo said the bank was in talks with Italy over hybrid bonds to bolster its capital ratios and assure lending to smaller companies.
UniCredit has signed up for a total of €4bn (£3.4bn) in state aid in Italy and Austria.
“Clearly we will behave in the best interests of our shareholders,” he said in a conference call,
“We are in the process of negotiating. The timing is September.”
UniCredit, Europe’s fourth-biggest bank by market value and the top lender in recession-hit eastern Europe, posted its best operating profit in two years as trading rose by €1.05bn from the first quarter to the second quarter.
Net profit was €490m, up 9.6 per cent from the previous quarter, it said in a statement.
With the bank still recovering from a pummelling in central and eastern Europe, a UniCredit survey of 29 analysts had forecast a mean net profit of €434m.