The Italian Banking System

Why was the Italian Banking System more resilient during the sub-prime crisis and harder-hit in the sovereign crisis? Will their strength in the retail market result as an asset or a liability for Italian banks in the future? This book offers an in-depth analysis of one of the most important EU banking systems its attempts to weather the crisis.

Damiano Bruno Silipo In the 1990s the Italian banking system underwent profound normative, institutional and structural changes. The Consolidated Law on Banking (1993) and that on Finance (1998) instituted the legal framework for a far-reaching overhaul of the Italian banking and ?nancial system: signi?cant relaxation of entry barriers, the liberalization of branching, the privatization of the Italian banks, and a massive process of mergers and acquisitions. Following the Bank of Italy’s liberalization of branching in 1990, in 10 years the number of bank branches increased by 70% in Italy, while in the rest of Europe it declined. Over the decade the average number of banks doing business in a province rose from 27 to 31, while a wave of mergers (324 operations) and acquisitions (137) revolutionized the Italian banking industry, reducing the overall number of Italian banks by 30%. To a signi?cant extent this concentration represented take-overs of troubled Southern banks by Central and Northern ones. As a result of these developments (plus a rise in banking productivity and a fall in costs), the spread between short-term lending and deposit rates fell from 7 percentage points in 1990 to 4 points in 1999. And despite an increase in concentration in a number of local credit markets, the interest-rate differential between the locally dominant and other banks generally narrowed.

This book looks at the banking and finance industries in Italy and how these industries contribute to the Italian economy. Could these industries be the solution to the contradiction in which the country's economy has been caught for several years: it is better governed than it has been in the past, but is not growing as much as it could. The book looks at how this solution might be achieved and what factors will govern the contribution of the banking and finance industries.

The ongoing globalization of financial markets has increased the import ance to users of financial services, policy-makers and financial analysts of understanding the structure and operation of banking systems in other countries as well as that in their own country. This volume contributes to such an understanding. The structure and operation of the banking system are described for 10 important countries, plus the European Economic Community, under one cover. The contributing authors are knowledgable and widely respected experts. The author, or at least one of the coauthors, of each chapter is a resident of the country described. Each chapter follows a broadly similar outline, although the attention devoted to any particular area varies substantially according to authors' perceptions of its relative importance in the particular country. The chapters spotlight the similarities and differences among the structures. The volume should serve as both a handy and authoritative reference guide for practitioners, regulators and students of international banking. An early benefit of the book was an international conference held in Chicago in the fall of 1989 on the world integration of financial markets. A number of the authors of the chapters presented brief versions of their papers. The conference was sponsored jointly by the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago and the MidAmerica Institute. The audience was primarily senior officers and regulators of financial institutions in the midwest. The conference generated considerable interest in both the subject matter and the contents of this book.

This Financial System Stability Assessment paper on Italy highlights that substantial progress has been made in recent years in strengthening the financial sector, however, important weaknesses remain. Bank capitalization and asset quality have improved considerably but are still below the European Union average and the financial sector has large exposures to the Italian sovereign. The financial sector faces important vulnerabilities and a challenging baseline outlook. The sector is highly dependent on the European Central Bank’s Targeted Longer-Term Refinancing Operations. Profitability is also still low, particularly in segments of small and mid-sized banks. This reflects in part weak economic growth in Italy over the past decade, as well as high structural operating costs, unsustainable business models and corporate governance weaknesses. Solvency stress tests indicate that many banks with material aggregate total asset share continue to be vulnerable to an adverse scenario. Efforts should focus on further enhancing banks’ capitalization, operational efficiency, governance, and business models. Specifically, the authorities should consider more escalated corrective measures for weak banks, utilizing the full gamut of their toolkit, to ensure that banking sector weaknesses do not linger, and costs are contained.

This paper examines the case for efficiency-driven banking sector consolidation in Italy, evaluates its potential effects on profitability, and discusses policy options to facilitate a consolidation process that is as effective as possible. A bottom-up analysis of 386 Italian banks suggests that while profitability is expected to improve as the economy gradually recovers, operational efficiency gains are nonetheless needed to restore large parts of the banking system to healthy profitability. Banking system consolidation can play a role in facilitating such efficiency gains, but its effectiveness is likely to be most as part of a comprehensive strategy that includes complementary reforms to clean up bank balance sheets. Cross-country experience indicates that efficiency gains are more likely to follow consolidations where careful viability analyses are conducted of the synergies and operational improvements that can be achieved.

The profitability of Italian banks depends, among other factors, on the strength of the ongoing economic recovery, the stance of monetary policy, and the beneficial effects of current and past reforms, notably to address structural obstacles to resolving nonperforming loans (NPLs) and to foster banking sector consolidation. Improved profitability would enable banks to raise capital buffers and accelerate the cleanup of their balance sheets. This paper investigates quantitatively the current and prospective earnings capacity of Italian banks. A bottom-up analysis of the 15 largest Italian banks suggests that the system is on the whole profitable, but that there is significant heterogeneity across banks. Many banks should become more profitable as the economy recovers, but their capacity to lend depends on the size of their capital buffers. However, a number of smaller banks face profitability pressures, even under favorable assumptions. There is thus a need to push ahead decisively on cleaning up balance sheets, including through cost cutting and efficiency gains.