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View of a wall with the Commerzbank logo. (zu dpa: \u00abBerlin slams UniCredit for ‘inappropriate’ Commerzbank takeover offer\u00bb) Hannes P Albert\/dpa <\/p>\n View of a wall with the Commerzbank logo. (zu dpa: \u00abBerlin slams UniCredit for ‘inappropriate’ Commerzbank takeover offer\u00bb) Hannes P Albert\/dpa <\/p>\n
The German government on Wednesday criticized UniCredit over what it called a \u201ccompletely inappropriate and unfair\u201d takeover bid for rival Commerzbank.<\/p>\n
UniCredit submitted a formal offer for Commerzbank on Tuesday, stepping up months of pressure on the German lender, which has continued to resist the approach.<\/p>\n
The Milan-based bank, which has steadily increased its holding to nearly 30% of Commerzbank shares, is seeking to acquire further stock through a voluntary share-swap offer set to expire on June 16. The offer period could be extended until July 3.<\/p>\n
Commerzbank\u2019s management, works council and employees have so far opposed what they view as a hostile bid. UniCredit has outlined a restructuring plan in the event of a takeover that could result in around 7,000 full-time job cuts, fuelling concern in Germany.<\/p>\n
The German government, which still holds a 12% stake in Commerzbank, has also rejected the move. Deputy government spokesman Sebastian Hille described UniCredit\u2019s approach as \u201ccompletely inappropriate and unfair.\u201d<\/p>\n
At the Finance Ministry, a spokesman reiterated Berlin\u2019s support for Commerzbank\u2019s independence, saying a \u201chostile, aggressive takeover\u201d would be unacceptable, particularly given the bank\u2019s status as a systemically important institution.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is clear to us that Commerzbank plays a vital role in financing the German economy and its small and medium-sized enterprises. It is also a major employer and central to Frankfurt as a financial centre \u2014 and both of these aspects must be safeguarded in the future,\u201d the spokesman said.<\/p>\n
Asked whether the government could increase its stake in Commerzbank, he declined to comment, describing it as a hypothetical scenario.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"View of a wall with the Commerzbank logo. (zu dpa: \u00abBerlin slams UniCredit for ‘inappropriate’ Commerzbank takeover offer\u00bb)…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11117,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[18,3487,6521],"class_list":{"0":"post-11116","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-berlin","8":"tag-berlin","9":"tag-commerzbank","10":"tag-unicredit"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11116","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11116"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11116\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11117"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}