ING met Italy's Popolare di Sondrio amid European expansion plan, source says

Amy-Jo Crowley

Sat, Mar 29, 2025, 11:40 AM 2 min read

By Amy-Jo Crowley

LONDON (Reuters) - ING Groep met with Italy's Banca Popolare di Sondrio successful caller weeks arsenic it seeks to turn successful Europe done takeovers, a idiosyncratic with cognition of the substance said. The aboriginal signifier discussions were not precocious and whitethorn not proceed to an connection by the Dutch bank, the idiosyncratic said.

ING and Sondrio declined to comment.

A bid by ING would rival a 4.3 cardinal euro ($4.7 billion) all-share connection by BPER Banca for Sondrio successful February, which was the latest successful a raft of takeover enactment successful Italy's banking sector.

BPER and Sondrio some person arsenic pb shareholder Unipol, Italy's second-largest insurer, which owns astir 20% of each lender.

Unipol Chairman Carlo Cimbri said connected Friday a overseas slope was studying a imaginable bid for Sondrio to rival BPER's.

Speaking astatine the presumption of Unipol's multi-year plan, Cimbri hinted astatine ING arsenic a imaginable suitor by saying the slope funny successful Sondrio was the colour of a journalist's tie, which was orange.

Headquartered successful the Valtellina valley, a affluent upland country northeast of Milan, Sondrio has enlisted the assistance of Bank of America and Morgan Stanley arsenic defence advisers against BPER.

The bankers person been speaking with imaginable bidders, the idiosyncratic said, speaking connected information of anonymity due to the fact that the substance is private.

Sondrio has already offered to instrumentality 1.5 cardinal euros to shareholders implicit 2025-2027, doubling the payout of the past 3 years, successful a determination to fend disconnected BPER.

BPER said its pursuit of Sondrio was a antiaircraft determination fixed the consolidation question successful the sector.

ING said successful February it was looking for opportunities to bargain rival banks successful large European countries including Italy, Spain and Germany to boost its size.

The Dutch lender has been progressive arsenic a retail slope successful Italy since 2001 and it is simply a starring integer slope successful the state serving 1.275 cardinal clients. It is presently looking to grow its deposit basal by offering a 4% instrumentality for a twelvemonth connected caller accounts opened earlier the extremity of May.

($1 = 0.9236 euros)

(Reporting by Amy-Jo Crowley successful London. Additional reporting by Elisa Martinuzzi and Valentina Za. Writing and editing by Anousha Sakoui. Additional editing by Mark Potter)