By Valentina Za
MILAN (Reuters) -UniCredit is ready to sit down with Credit Agricole (OTC:CRARY), a spokesperson for the Italian bank said in a LinkedIn post after the French lender increased its potential stake in Unicredit (BIT:CRDI)'s takeover target Banco BPM.
UniCredit's bid for its smaller peer prompted Credit Agricole to say on Friday it had entered derivatives that would raise its stake in BPM to 15% from 9.9% once the European Central Bank gives its green light.
"Yesterday's news about Credit Agricole's increased stake in BPM changes nothing for UniCredit," the spokesperson for UniCredit said on social media network LinkedIn.
"We were always prepared to negotiate with CA, as this would have been necessary whatever the scale of their shareholding."
Sources with knowledge of the French bank's strategy have told Reuters Credit Agricole's focus is to protect the commercial partnerships that allow it to sell its products in Italy. Credit Agricole has ruled out a full buyout of BPM, in which it is the single biggest shareholder.
"UniCredit's early move made Credit Agricole's investment more expensive and more complicated. BPM shareholders should not welcome this development," the UniCredit spokesperson said.
UniCredit last month claimed a seat at Italy's bank consolidation table by launching a 10 billion euro ($11 billion) all-share unsolicited bid for Banco BPM.
The move scuppered plans by the Rome government to broker a merger between BPM and state-backed Monte dei Paschi di Siena. Both banks partner with fund manager Anima Holding, which Banco BPM is in the process of taking over.
On Saturday, sources told Reuters that Credit Agricole had got informal backing from the Rome government prior to announcing its increased stake in Banco BPM.
The UniCredit spokesperson warned BPM shareholders they should be wary of a potential combination of BPM with the Italian business of Credit Agricole, or of any attempt to merge BPM with Monte dei Paschi.
A bid for Monte dei Paschi is a possible defence strategy for BPM, which has spurned UniCredit's offer as too cheap.
"Credit Agricole's likely options would be to merge BPM with Credit Agricole Italia (on attractive terms for Credit Agricole) or face a complicated combination with Monte dei Paschi. Both of these routes would destroy BPM shareholder value," the UniCredit spokesperson said.($1 = 0.9463 euros)