Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena Raises Nearly 5 Billion Euros

By Giovanni Legorano 

MILAN--Italian lender Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena SpA on Friday hailed as a success the completion of its nearly EUR5 billion cash call aimed at raising funds to pay back part of a government loan it obtained last year.

The bank said it sold 99.85% of new shares over the past three weeks raising EUR4.992 billion (around $6.8 billion).

"A positive result for Monte dei Paschi and for the [Italian] state," Chief Executive Fabrizio Viola said in a statement.

The bank obtained a government loan of EUR4.1 billion last year in order to plug a capital shortfall identified by the European Banking Authority in late 2011.

The lender said in a statement that the completion of the capital increase will allow the bank to pay EUR3.5 billion to the Italian government. This amount includes EUR3 billion in repayment of the principal of the loan, around EUR350 million in interest on the loan matured in 2013 and the rest due to some clauses which are part of the agreement at the base of the loan.

The cash call was guaranteed by a pool of banks led by UBS, which had agreed to buy any unsold shares.

In order to obtain the loan last year, the bank agreed to implement a restructuring plan, including heavy cost cuts. For the first quarter of this year, it posted its eighth consecutive quarterly loss, hit by high provisions for losses on loans, around a quarter of which went sour.

If the bank didn't manage to raise the funds this year, the government loan would have been converted into shares, effectively nationalizing the bank.

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