Highways, step back from the Benettons. Conte speaks to the Senate: 'We are quite satisfied'

The step back of the Benettons arrives and opens the agreement on Autostrade per l'Italia. The agreement passes through the entry of Cdp with 51%, which will effectively make Aspi a public company. And from an overall revision of the concession, from compensation to tariffs. 

It is dawn when, after six hours of very tense meeting and tough discussions, the Council of Ministers mandates Cassa Depositi e Prestiti to start, by 27 July, the path that should lead to the progressive exit of the Benettons, first going down to 10-12% of the shareholding, then with a further dilution coinciding with the listing on the stock exchange of Aspi. Among the points of the settlement proposal of Aspi arrived in Cdm is the "renunciation of all the judgments promoted in relation to the reconstruction activities of the Morandi bridge, to the tariff system, including the judgments brought against the resolutions of the Transport Regulation Authority (ART) and the appeals to contest the legitimacy of art. 35 of the "Milleproroghe" law decree. "Furthermore, the" rewriting of the clauses of the agreement in order to adapt them to article 35 of the "Milleproroghe" decree ", which reduced the compensation in case of revocation from 23 to 7 billion .

"It is another dossier that we have brought back to reason." So Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte answered a question about aspi, arriving at the Senate. "We are quite satisfied," added Conte.

"Nothing is known yet" of the agreement between the government and Aspi: "Cost of the works, who gains and who loses us. We know a lot of rip-off and we want them to be clear". Matteo Salvini, asked by ANSA upon entering the Senate, explains that the League will bring its motion on Aspi to the Chamber. The vote is expected to take place next week.

De Micheli, solution for the protection of Italians and work - "The solution of the Aspi government affair protects the public interest of all Italians and workers of the company. Now ahead with the investments already defined for the infrastructures and the fundamental maintenance works for the safety of our highways ". So the Minister of Infrastructure Paola De Micheli on Twitter.

Atlantia, further leap in Piazza Affari (+ 25%) - Atlantia breaks a new diaphragm in Piazza Affari, where it gains 25.69% at 14.28 euros, returning to the levels of last July 8th. The 1.7 billion euros lost on Monday (-15.19% to 11.36 euros) after the rejection of the Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte to Aspi's 3.4 billion euro proposal have been recovered. A decline, that of Monday, higher than that recorded between 4 and 18 March last, when the stock had plummeted to 9.82 euros following the motorway and airport traffic data for the Covid emergency. Today's leap exceeds the debacle of 16 August 2018 (-22.25%) in the aftermath of the collapse of the Ponte Morandi, but with a price well below the 18.3 euros of the time.

The reactions to the agreement - Di Maio: 'Excellent result'. Zingaretti: 'Good choice'. While the League is attacking

Satisfied the premier, Giuseppe Conte, according to whom, the state won, the citizens won.  "Yesterday something absolutely unprecedented happened in Italian political history. The government affirmed a principle, trampled in the past: public infrastructures are a precious public good, which must be managed responsibly, guaranteeing the full safety of citizens and a service efficient ", writes Conte on Fb. "An unpublished page of our history was written in yesterday's CDM. Public interest has prevailed over a well-established lump of private interests. The state has won. The citizens have won," he adds.

THE COUNT POST

The CDM press release states that for the entry of Cassa Depositi e Prestiti into Aspi, the settlement proposal provides for a capital increase for the acquisition of control by Cdp and the exit of Aspi from the perimeter of Atlantia. "Alternatively, Atlantia offered to sell the entire 88% stake in Aspi directly to Cdp and institutional investors of its choice . " This is stated in the press release of the CDM.

The settlement proposal also provides - according to what is stated in the press release of the CDM - "compensatory measures at the exclusive expense of Aspi for the total amount of € 3.4 billion" and "acceptance of the tariff discipline introduced by the ART (Regulatory Authority of transport, editor's note) with a significant moderation in tariff dynamics "is one of the other points.

Ministers Roberto Gualtieri, who brought the company's final proposal to the CDM table, and Paola De Micheli are given the mandate to define the other aspects of the agreement. To the last, Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte holds the revocation weapon on the table: "If the commitments made tonight are not respected, it will be revoked" , explains a minister.

The latest negotiation between the Prime Minister and the Benettons is consummated during the night, during a fiery Council of Ministers that sees the head of government squeezed between suspects inside the majority, the irritation of Iv and an M5S that looks more like a volcano ready to boil. In Cdm Gualtieri, who describe not contrary in principle to the revocation but convinced that he can find a better solution, brings a new proposal by Aspi. But that's not enough, and a long and very tough negotiation starts, which leads the company to send four different letters to the government during the night to perfect a draft agreement.

Conte and also the Five stars, for the part of the corporate structure, immediately declare themselves dissatisfied: the gradual exit of Benetton will require too long a negotiation, according to pentastellate sources. "No division," says a source of government Pd. But among the Dems themselves, the dossier brings tensions. And the climate in Palazzo Chigi becomes heavy. Skip a meeting of the heads of delegation that had been called before the CDM: they say it was Dario Franceschini who asked to meet directly in the Council, where De Micheli and Gualtieri also sit.

The CDM is opened around 11 pm and suspended shortly thereafter. This does not go down to Teresa Bellanova, who makes it a question of method: when Conte and Gualtieri meet to decide how to conduct the final negotiation, the head of the delegation of Iv, the only party openly against the revocation, reveals his irritation. But it is above all the irritation in the Movement that emerged during the long night of Chigi: it is also addressed - perhaps above all - to the prime minister, in a crescendo that makes some exponent of the majority hypothesize as possible even the scenario a summer turnaround. Beyond plots and suggestions, Conte plays a lot on the Autostrade dossier.

The interview with Il Fatto Quotidiano marked a change of pace in his strategy. And, before the CDM, the premier does not change lines. "Either Aspi accepts the conditions that the government has already submitted to it or there will be revocation", is the latest warning with which Conte enters the Palazzo Chigi meeting. Also because, he says to his parents, "you cannot prevaricate". The premier is not willing to take steps back on the cut in motorway tariffs, on the modification of article 35 of the Milleproroghe decree which reduces compensation in the event of revocation from 23 to 7 billion, on the indemnity to relieve the State from claims for compensation related to Ponte Morandi and on the right of withdrawal, for the future, in the event of serious breaches by the concessionaire, compensating only the non-amortized investments. But the novelty that allows the negotiation to break free concerns the shareholding: the Benettons give the availability to the separation of Autostrade from Atlantia, to the simultaneous entry of Cdp into Aspi and to the subsequent listing on the Stock Exchange.

The process, which according to government sources would take place within six months or a year, would take place in two phases: in the first Cdp it would enter with 51% and there would be the spin-off that would carry the weight of the Benetton family between 10 and 12 %, threshold below which the Board is not entered; in the second there would be the listing in which it should lead to a company with a high shareholder base, up to 50%, in which new shareholders could enter, with a market operation, further lowering the weight of the Benetton family. But on the temporal range of the Benetton release, the M5S immediately shows an evident skepticism.

"It is too long," explains an authoritative source of the Movement. That, already in the afternoon, did not hide the irritation for the management of De Micheli, inserted - in the pentastellate hypotheses - in the farewell box in a possible reshuffle in September. A letter of March transpires during the day in which the minister pushed for an agreement and asked Conte to act but some of the Dems do not like it: "It is not the initiative of the Democratic Party", say from the party, while among the parliamentary ranks emerge different souls. Around midnight, when the CDM is suspended, the company's proposal still does not convince the government: "It is not enough", the premier observes. But it was decided to negotiate, to the end, to avoid revocation: the negotiation with the "Sherpas" of the Benettons continues in parallel. At dawn in the Council of Ministers, after a croissant offered to all colleagues by Vincenzo Spadafora, we read the latest letter sent by the company: "It accepts all government requests", says a minister. The M5s asks until the very end that Benetton really leaves the company. The revocation of the concession is not removed from the table, given that the technical aspects of the negotiation will have to be perfected, but it now seems very far away.