(Finance) – “Unicredit has great possibilities to grow organically, but M&A must be an accelerator of our strategy. Our job is to see all the opportunities in the markets we are in, but any transaction must meet clear criteria, for example it must not affect our distribution capacity. We do not need to do anything, we have the critical mass: if there are opportunities we will seize them if there are no no “. This is what the CEO of Unicredit, Andrea Orcel, in the conference call that followed the release of the results for the fourth quarter of 2021 and for the full year. The expected shareholder remuneration of € 3.75 billion “is the highest in the history of the bank,” the banker stressed.
Orcel also confirmed the rumors that indicated the institute in Piazza Gae Aulenti interested in the Otkritie Bank of Russia. “We went through the early stages of due diligence, evaluating one controlling share through an IPO“, he explained, but” we have decided to withdraw due to the geopolitical situation. “The plan was to acquire a controlling stake with the transfer of its Russian assets, and therefore without any impact on the dividend policy. The group – added the banker – “stay in Russia“, country” is part of our network and we have always had a presence higher than our cost of capital “. Orcel then said he was happy with the presence in Russia which” has no significant impact on our cost of risk also given the size of the total of our activities “.
In the agreements made with Allianz“there is theoption to terminate the partnership from 2024, but the expectation is that it will continue“, said CFO Stefano Porro, commenting on the agreement announced in the morning between the two groups to strengthen the partnership. The agreement for Italy, in fact, includes the renewal until 2027 of the agreements currently in place in the life and damage, “with margins of strategic flexibility for Unicredit“starting in 2024. On this deal, Orcel said it” is an example of how we intend to streamline our joint ventures and maximize the benefits of all future partnerships. ”