INTESA SANPAOLO STRENGTHENS ITS PRESENCE IN BRAZIL

AND ESTABLISHES A NEW ENTITY DEDICATED

TO CORPORATE CUSTOMERS

 

• Gaetano Miccichè, General Manager of Intesa Sanpaolo: “In Brazil with a real bank, in support of internationalisation and further consolidating the connection between local and international customers”

 

Saõ Paulo/Milan, 26 June 2014 - Intesa Sanpaolo moves ahead with the strategy to strengthen its international network with the imminent opening of a subsidiary bank in Saõ Paulo, Brazil.

 

The actual operational start-up is planned in the next few months, after the commercial bank and investment bank licences have been obtained with authorisation to operate both in local currency and on the forex market. It will therefore be a “Banco Múltiplo”, or multi-purpose bank, according to the Brazilian banking authority’s definition, and will act as a true business partner to all effects and purposes, working alongside Italian businesses and Brazilian and international companies operating in the country.

 

100% dedicated to corporate customers, the new operations unit will form part of the International Department of the Corporate and Investment Banking Division and will operate closely with the Group’s international network and Italian structures.

 

From the point of view of industrial sectors, a special focus will be placed on those particularly important to the Brazilian economy, such as infrastructures, oil and gas, energy and agriculture.

 

The Saõ Paulo office will provide an advanced platform of products and services to meet the needs of customers, providing them with commercial development and investment support. In particular, businesses will be able to make use of dedicated advisory services for their entry to the Brazilian market and for promoting cross-border activities such as loans for exports, credit insurance, export factoring and international project finance.

 

A set of services for the management and growth of Brazilian branches of corporate customers will also be available: from cash management to short, medium and long-term lending; from structured finance to investment banking and capital markets, implemented in partnership with Banca IMI, the Intesa Sanpaolo Group’s investment bank.

 

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“For our Group, the opening of the new Saõ Paulo branch represents a long-awaited return to a market that has always been fundamental to us. Within a few months, in fact, our presence will take on the aspect of a leading entity, as a result of the opportunity to operate as a true bank, through all the products and services we can offer to businesses”, states Gaetano Miccichè, General Manager and Head of the Corporate & Investment Banking Division of Intesa Sanpaolo. “Brazil constitutes another milestone in the growth of our organisation at international level. This path is one that we consider indispensable, one that will allow us to accompany businesses on the global markets: on the one hand to seize upon the best opportunities for growth and internationalisation of our industrial fabric, and on the other to make our experience, professionalism and network available also to local and international customers in Brazil”, Miccichè concludes.

 

The International Department of Intesa Sanpaolo’s Corporate & Investment Banking Division was designed to accompany Italian businesses on the foreign markets and to assuring them the Group’s full series of operations in over 40 countries. Through a network of Branches, Representative Offices and Banks specialised in corporate banking, Intesa Sanpaolo provides support for corporate customers’ cross-border activities in 29 countries. This particularly in the Middle East and North Africa and in areas where the dynamism of Italian companies is strongest, such as the United States, Russia, India and China. It also guarantees strategic territorial coverage in 12 countries in Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East and North Africa where it provides both retail and commercial banking services and corporate banking services through the subsidiary banks headed by the International Subsidiary Banks Division.