Board Meeting of 29 January 2014: preliminary results for 2013

Rome, 29 January 2013 - Cassa Depositi e Prestiti Spa (CDP) announces that the Board of Directors, meeting today under the chairmanship of Franco Bassanini, examined the preliminary results for 2013.

Resources mobilised in 2013 and over the course of the three-year planning period

Last year CDP carried out lending and investments totalling about €16 billion, an increase of some 30% compared with 2012.

With the end of 2013, the period covered by the 2011 – 2013 Business Plan came to an close, with all initial targets exceeded despite substantial changes in market conditions: total new lending and investment by CDP over the period amounted to €56 billion, in excess of the original €43 billion target. For the 2013-2015 period, the Business Plan provides for CDP and its subsidiaries to mobilise up to €87 billion, taking account of recent legislative measures (the 2014 Stability Act) that have expanded CDP’s mission in supporting enterprises.

The following paragraphs highlight the operations and preliminary results of CDP in 2013.

Public entities

• Lending and leveraging public real estate holdings. In 2013, resources made available to public entities nearly doubled to almost €6 billion, compared with €3.3 billion in 2012. Contributing to the rise was CDP’s activity in providing advances on payments of general government liabilities (managed on behalf of the Ministry for the Economy and Finance) and the operations of Fondo FIV Plus in developing the property assets of the State and local governments.

Infrastructure

• Financing. Financing for infrastructure projects amounted to about €2.2 billion. This figure was achieved thanks to project finance initiatives for major infrastructure projects in the motorway sector as well as direct financing of the investment plans of local multiutilities.

Enterprises

• In 2013 CDP continued to support the growth of the country, channelling most of its resources through its economic support products, which delivered €8.3 billion in resources. The funds went towards loans and equity capital investments, directed at both SMEs and large companies. Major initiatives include the additional resources contributed to Fondo Strategico Italiano (€2.5 billion), financing granted under the SME support funds (€3.2 billion) and the export bank system operated with SACE to support exports and the international expansion of enterprises (€1.8 billion).

Preliminary financial and performance figures for 2013

The expansion of CDP’s activity to support the economy, both through the granting of credit and equity financing, is evident in the preliminary year-end figures. Compared with 2012, loans to customers and banks rose by about 3% (€103.3 billion at the end of 2013) – while the CDP’s market contracted by about 6% - and equity investments rose by about €2 billion (to more than €32 billion).

On the liabilities side, the stock of postal funding should amount to more than €242 billion, with positive net fundingpertaining to CDP of about €3.6 billion.

The cost/income ratio remains very low, at about 4%.

Equity is estimated at more than €18 billion, up about 8% on 2012.

Net interest income is projected to fall to €2.6 billion from the €3.5 billion posted in 2012, due to the expected contraction in the spread between lending and funding rates as a result of the decline in market interest rates. Consequently, 2013 should close with lower net income than in 2012 (€2.9 billion, of which about €500 million from non-recurring gains on equity investments), but still higher than the Plan target for 2013 (€2 billion).