agreed to form a joint venture, in which the German lessor is
expected to acquire, for €369 million, a 60 percent stake in the
business unit that will operate in the market of leasing and
factoring.
The Milan-based company said the partnership with VR Leasing, a
subsidiary of Frankfurt-based DZ Bank, will include €8 billion of
Italease’s receivables for leasing transactions deriving from the
company’s direct and banking channels; €2 billion receivables from
factory transactions; and a debt portfolio of around €9.7
billion.
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However, the letter of intent signed by Italease in October
states the deal will exclude activities worth around €13 billion,
which include lease receivables deriving from the channel of
agents, intermediaries and suppliers, medium- and long-term
corporate loans and retail mortgages.
Debts to banks, securitisations and other debts, including those
deriving from its activities in derivatives, are also going to be
excluded.
People familiar with the deal believe that since the joint
venture substantially reduces the activities of Italease in the
leasing sector, this will determine a shift in the core activities
of the company, especially if VR Leasing decides to play the card
that allows it to acquire the remaining 40 percent in the joint
venture between June 2010 and December 2011 for a price of €246
million or above.
It is expected that the bank management, led by managing
director Massimo Mazzega, will soon determine, together with Banca
Italease shareholders, how the new company will look. This may
include the possibility to change its name, as it would
symbolically mark a definitive turning point in the history of
Italease.
The Italian lessor, after reporting a disastrous year’s trading
in 2007 – followed by a radical restructuring that allowed a return
to profitability in 2008 – had been desperately looking for a
potential partnership with a domestic or international company to
help it to recover its losses of more than €500 million following
investments in the US mortgage sector.
Banca Italease said the new joint venture would represent “a
strategic alliance with an operator of great visibility and
leadership at a European level” and that it expected that the
business unit would benefit from the “geographic complementarities”
and a “consistent financial support” from VR Leasing.
VR Leasing has still to obtain formal approval from its parent
company by 30 November.
The definitive agreement has to be finalised before 12 December
and it should include the mention of a “qualified presence” of
Banca Italease members in the management team of the joint
venture.
Antonio Fabrizio
