Unipol: the 2.5 billion capital increase goes ahead

Unipol’s 2.5 billion capital increase, aimed at acquiring 635 MPS branches from Intesa Sanpaolo, has been successfully completed.

According to the company’s announcement, the rights issue closed with 98.42 per cent of the newly issued shares subscribed, for a total amount of 2.46 billion. The few unexercised subscription rights – totalling 11,321,451 rights, which entitle holders to subscribe for the remaining 1.58 per cent of the new shares on offer, with a total value of 39,452.378.40, will be offered on the stock exchange on 28 and 29 October, whilst full subscription to the capital increase is in any case guaranteed by the underwriting syndicate comprising J.P. Morgan, BNP Paribas, Deutsche Bank, Morgan Stanley and Equita SIM.

All the company’s major shareholders – namely the co-operatives – took part in the massive cash injection; they had already pledged their support when the transaction was announced, having ‘verbally’ committed to covering half the amount. In particular, those party to the shareholders’ agreement “fully honoured their subscription commitments” by purchasing a total of 61,126,720 new shares, with a total value of approximately 1.257 billion euros, representing 50.27 per cent of the shares offered.

It should be noted that the recapitalisation took place at a discount of 18.75 per cent on the TERP. All things considered, this is a low level compared with the average of the most recent share issues launched on the Milan Stock Exchange.