"Banca Intesa" to merge with bank "Sanpaolo IMI"

"Banca Intesa" announced today (August 29, 2006) merging with bank "Sanpaolo IMI", which would make new banking group the fifth bank in Europe worth about 65 billion EUR on the world stock exchange.

It is expected that the expenses of the integration of the two banks will amount to about 1.5 billion EUR and that the newly created banking group will have total net profit of 7 billion EUR in 2009.

Toward leading position

The decision on merging has been made by the ADministrative Board of "Banca Intesa" on August 26, 2006, and the reason for the merging, as seen by that bank, is the additional strengthening of the leading position, which would lead to market share of 20% in Italy.

The new group will have operative headquarters in Milano and Torino and its network will be made of more than 6,000 offices in Italy.