MILAN (Reuters) – Italy’s largest bank Intesa Sanpaolo said it would partner with BlackRock, the world’s biggest asset manager and a leading Intesa shareholder, to offer digital wealth management services to clients in Belgium and Luxembourg.
By teaming up with BlackRock, Intesa Sanpaolo’s private banking unit Fideuram will broaden its digital offering of investments to clients in those two countries, with a view to expanding further in Europe.
“This agreement is a perfect fit with our strategy based on the growth of our wealth management business and the development of new digital solutions,” CEO Carlo Messina said.
With a strong focus on its home country, which accounts for the bulk of its profits, Intesa has bet on investments in technology to grow.
It launched last year Fideuram Direct, a digital private banking channel to serve younger customers leveraging technology to compete in a sector where players are increasingly betting on scale to lower costs.
Messina has repeatedly said there are no wealth management targets Intesa could buy at prices that would deliver value for shareholders.
Intesa can’t expand domestically due to antitrust limits after buying smaller peer UBI in 2020. A cross-border deal like the possible Commerzbank buy being explored by crosstown rival UniCredit would not provide enough cost cuts without the foreign presence of UniCredit, Messina has said.
Earlier this year Intesa reorganised its core wealth management activities under veteran executive Tommaso Corcos, widely seen as one of the potential successors to CEO Messina in the future.
On Friday, Intesa said it was further simplifying its wealth management divisions.
It said it would have one division within its Eurizon asset management business in charge of funds, and another division within Fideuram in charge of all portfolio management services offered by financial advisors and private bankers.
(Reporting by Valentina Za; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)
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