| Series Title | European Voice |
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| Series Details | Vol.11, No.16, 28.4.05 |
| Publication Date | 28/04/2005 |
| Content Type | News |
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Date: 28/04/05 The Bank of Italy has until Wednesday (4 May) to convince Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes's department (DG Comp) that it is not blocking ABN Amro's take-over of Italian bank Banca Antonveneta, or risk facing regulatory action. Competition watchdogs are "concerned" that the Bank told ABN Amro that it could not raise its stake in Antoneta above 20%, and has demanded a response from Antonio Fazio, the bank's governor, before Wednesday. Fazio is reported to have close links with the CEO of ABN Amro's bidding rival, the Banca Popolare di Lodi. Late on Wednesday night (27 April), the Bank gave ABN Amro permission to increase its stake in Antonveneta to 30% but this may have come too late. The Dutch bank is worried that it may have missed the deadline for acquiring the shares in order to exercise its increased voting rights at Antonveneta's annual general meeting on Saturday (30 April). The Commission's competition spokesman Jonathan Todd said that under EU merger law the Commission had sole jurisdiction to rule on such cross-border banking deals. The executive today (April 28) has cleared ABN Amro's bid for Antonveneta under the EU merger regulation. "We want to be sure that measures taken by the Bank of Italy do not represent a veto on ABN Amro's bid, and that if it does that it is on genuine grounds," Todd said. If the Commission does not get a satisfactory response and has enough evidence, it can directly adopt a decision saying that Italy is in breach of EU law, which Italy could then only challenge in the courts. Article reports that the European Commission's DG Competition has asked the Bank of Italy to clarify whether it had been attempting to block a merger between Italian bank 'Banca Antonveneta' by the Dutch banking group ABN Amro. The takeover was cleared by the European Commission, which under EU merger law had sole jurisdiction to rule on such cross-border banking deals, on 28 April 2005. |
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| Source Link | http://www.european-voice.com/ |
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| Subject Categories | Internal Markets |
| Countries / Regions | Europe, Italy, Netherlands |
