Italy Bank Mergers Possible After ECB Tests, Industry Group Says

The European Central Bank’s review of the region’s lenders may prompt some consolidation in the Italian financial industry, the head of the country’s banking lobby said.

“This is something that can happen,” Giovanni Sabatini, director general of the Italian Banking Association, said in an interview today in Rome. “The commercial banking model is under pressure” and there’s a need for “restructuring of the system, a search for more efficiency to increase productivity and reduce costs.”