By Oscar Bodini and Gilles Castonguay
MILAN--The world's largest asset manager BlackRock Inc. has sold
part of its stake in troubled lender Banca Monte dei Paschi di
Siena SpA (BMPS.MI).
BlackRock reduced its stake in the bank to 3.2% from 5.8%, said
Consob, the country's market regulator, Wednesday. The asset
manager's original investment in Monte dei Paschi, announced by the
regulator in March, was thought to signal renewed investor
confidence in Italy.
BlackRock, which owns its stake through different companies
located in Europe, Asia, Australia and North America, declined
comment.
Tuscan lender Monte dei Paschi plans to raise EUR5 billion
($6.90 billion) from a share sale to pay back at least part of a
government loan of EUR4.1 billion it took last year to plug a
capital shortfall. If doesn't carry out a share sale this year, the
bank, often described as the world's oldest, will be
nationalized.
Monte dei Paschi's shares rose 2.8% to EUR0.25 in Milan
Wednesday and the stock has increased 37.6% in past three months.
Wednesday's share price rise comes after Goldman Sachs upgraded the
stock to neutral from sell.
Among its other Italian holdings, BlackRock owns 5% of Intesa
Sanpaolo SpA (ISP.MI) and 5.3% of UniCredit SpA (UCG.MI), the
country's two biggest banks.
Giovanni Legorano contributed to this article.
Write to Gilles Castonguay at gilles.castonguay@wsj.com;
Twitter: @GRCastonguay
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