Monte dei Paschi di Siena has launched two separate all-share takeover bids for Banco BPM and Banca Generali with a combined value of about €34 billion. The proposed transactions would create a larger Italian banking group with a market value estimated at roughly €70 billion.
MPS is offering 1.567 newly issued shares for each Banco BPM share, valuing that lender at €25.3 billion. It is offering 6.958 new shares for each Banca Generali share, valuing the wealth manager at about €8.7 billion.
The bids are a strategic response to Intesa Sanpaolo’s hostile cash-and-share approach for MPS, valued at roughly €36 billion. MPS management opposes the break-up envisaged under Intesa’s plan and is trying to preserve the Siena bank as the centre of an independent group.
If both offers succeed, the combination would rank as Italy’s third-largest banking group and among Europe’s ten largest banks. MPS projects a pro forma balance sheet of about €466 billion and more than €810 billion in total customer financial assets.
The offers are legally separate rather than mutually dependent, so one could proceed without the other. Neither acquisition has been completed, and the target companies’ shareholders retain the choice of whether to tender their shares.
MPS estimates recurring annual pre-tax synergies of about €2.6 billion. It also proposes an extraordinary €4 billion distribution to its existing shareholders, comprising €1 billion in cash and roughly €3 billion of Generali shares held by the group.
If both bids receive full acceptance, existing MPS shareholders would own about 50.1% of the combined company, Banco BPM shareholders 37.2% and Banca Generali shareholders 12.7%. Support from large investors, including Crédit Agricole at Banco BPM and Generali at Banca Generali, will therefore be important.
MPS shareholders are due to vote on October 29, with a two-thirds majority required for the defensive strategy. The bids also need regulatory approvals and relevant acceptance thresholds, and completion is targeted by mid-February 2027; until those steps are met, the €34 billion package remains a pair of offers.
