Is the Banca Intesa/San Paolo IMI merger case really over?
By the decision n. 20806 ( case 8027B Banca Intesa/San Paolo IMI ) the Italian Competition Authority (ICA) has accepted the remedies offered by Intesa SanPaolo (ISP), Credit Agricole( CA) and Assicurazioni Generali ( AG ) to resolve the competition problems raised in the divestiture process of the Banca Intesa/San Paolo IMI merger . The purchaser of the assets to be divested for gaining regulatory approval identified by the parties, CA , did not meet the requirement of independence. So the ICA imposed a set of further conditions to make sure that CA would be an independent operator from ISP. Believing the parties did not comply with these conditions, the ICA opened a compliance procedure. To dispel the ICA concern, the parties proposed the following remedies, which have been accepted by the ICA: 1)CA would gradually reduce its 5% stake in ISP under an indisclosed threshold 2)CA and AG would terminate the 2009 shareholder agreement regarding their stake in ISP, which empowe