Intesa CEO rules out acting as 'white knight' on Banco BPM against UniCredit

Intesa Sanpaolo ISP will not run to the rescue of Banco BPM BAMI as the latter strives to fend off an unsolicited takeover bid with near zero premium by UniCredit UCG, the CEO of Italy's biggest bank was quoted as saying on Thursday.

Intesa CEO Carlo Messina said his bank's market share in Italy was such that it could not expand further, preventing it from acting as "white knight", Italian newswires Adnkronos and Radiocor reported.

"We're white because we're good people but we're not knights in these deals for a very simple reason, because we've got such a high market share in Italy that we can't pursue any deals," Messina said when asked about UniCredit-BPM.

"So, aside from the fact that we don't want to do it, we wouldn't be able to," he told reporters on the sidelines of an event in Turin.