Bper, Montani: ‘Focus on branches but if involved in m & a we will not shy away’

At the moment the priority of Bper remains “the integration of the branch of branches, which is the most important asset we have today” but “clearly we could be involved in the m & a process and in case we would not withdraw. interest of the bank and shareholders, we are perfectly capable of being able to deal with it “. This was stated by Piero Luigi Montani, CEO of Bper, in a conference call with analysts. “We are not thinking about other operations now, but the market goes on, we will evaluate the options and we could be involved. In case – he reiterated – we will evaluate the convenience for the shareholders”. “There aren’t many banks left – he underlines -. There are Unicredit and Intesa large ones, while there are banks of our size from Popolare di Sondrio, Banca Carige, Banco Bpm and Mps. It is likely that there will be aggregations in this scenario, however there are few banks left “, says CEO A another question on the subject of an analyst, Montani clarified that in the bank” we are perfectly aware that there will be an integration and we could also be interested, however today the bank is working with 18 thousand employees and more than a thousand branches. So even in the remote scenario in which we have to be alone we will be in a position to be able to hold onto the market and produce a profit and satisfy shareholders. I am not convinced that the banks will run away and there will always be an opportunity for an interesting aggregation “, he concludes.