49th Credit Day
Banks, other financial intermediaries and firms:
what needs to be done for Italy's development
Finance and development
Speech by the Senior Deputy Governor of the Bank of Italy and
President of IVASS
Salvatore Rossi
INDEX
Italian finance has begun to change .................................................. 4
Yet this is not enough .......................................................................... 5
Firms .............................................................................................. 6
Institutional investors ...................................................................... 8
The rest of the financial market .................................................... 10
The outlook ......................................................................................... 11
The theme of this year's Credit Day is not new, but the Italian economy's
current status makes it relevant and topical once again. What role can finance
play in transforming our economy's cyclical growth into real, long-lasting,
structural growth? The type of growth that Italy hasn't seen for the last 20
years, though it alone can help us lower unemployment levels, improve the
quality of labour, and raise living standards in a stable way? In other words,
put Italy at the top of the list of advanced countries, as it was in the past?
By finance we mean all the financing activities on the part of families and
firms, undertaken by financial intermediaries such as banks or other non-bank
professionals or entities working directly in the financial and capital markets.
We will look at it in terms of both supply and demand, and will then assess
both the behaviour of those needing financing and the products offered to
satisfy those needs, including the manner in which they are offered.
For some time now we have been saying that Italy's financial structure
must change if we also want the productive economy to move towards
greater growth. We would like firms to make greater use of the markets and
to rely less on financial intermediaries, especially banks. Paradoxically, by
downsizing their role banks may find a path towards greater profitability,
offering higher returns on their growing capital. In essence we would like a
virtuous cycle, one that fosters greater growth for the economy and more
stability for the banking system.
The reasons behind this wish are well established so I will not dwell on
them: most important of all is the fact that growth feeds on innovation, which
is a riskier proposal than proven, traditional productive activity, and it is best
to finance innovation with capital rather than loans, especially bank loans,
because banks are, and must be, more risk averse than the rest of the
financial community.
Two weeks ago in Courmayeur I focused on the glass being half empty,
that is, the road that still separates us from this objective. Today I would like
to look first at the glass being half full, focusing on the progress that has been
made over the past few years.1 My analysis will focus on firms and their
demand for financing.
Italian finance has begun to change
Since 2011, private-sector firms' leverage has fallen by more than 7
percentage points to 42 per cent (excluding banks and other financial
professionals, calculated as the ratio between debt and debt plus net capital).
This reduction has affected firms of all sizes. In large firms (those with
more than 250 employees or with assets or turnover above €50 million) this
was mostly due to an increase in net capital, thanks to the positive effects of
the recovery, which has favoured both higher market value for capital and the
reinvestment of profits in firms. The allowance for corporate equity (ACE), a
measure enacted in 2012 which finally gave risk capital and debt the same
tax treatment, also played a part.2 However, the weakening of this measure
as of this year will greatly limit its effects going forward.
Leverage has decreased in the other size classes too, though mainly
due to the decline in bank loans: many small firms, already greatly in debt,
have left the market or found it difficult to renew their credit lines.
Recourse to the stock market has increased, especially in recent years.
Between 2014 and 2016 over 60 firms were quoted on the stock exchange,
mainly on the Alternative Investment Market (AIM), a market segment with
lower entry costs. In the same period, investments by private equity and
venture capital firms in risk capital returned to pre-crisis levels of around €5
billion a year. Despite the positive contribution from various public schemes,
such as the Italian Investment Fund and the Business Register for innovative
start-ups, the share of investment in start-ups or in high-growth firms is still
modest by international standards: in 2016 it stood at 15 per cent, against 23
per cent in Germany and almost 40 per cent in France and Spain.
During the crisis, not only did the relative weight of debt and risk capital
change, but so did the composition of firms' sources of debt, with a growth in
bonds to the detriment of bank lending.
Since 2011 the share of bonds in overall financial debt has risen by 5
percentage points to 12 per cent; that of loans granted by Italian banks has
fallen in equal measure to 61 per cent.
During the most acute phases of the credit restriction triggered by the
global financial crisis and then by the European sovereign debt crisis,
recourse to the financial market proved to be feasible only for a few large
industrial groups that were already active in that market. However, the
number of issuers has grown in recent years, also among small firms, thanks
to the removal of tax burdens and legal constraints on unlisted companies:
for example, around 140 firms have issued minibonds worth over €10 billion
since the relative measure came into force in 2012.
Yet this is not enough
Now we come to the half empty glass. The progress made is undeniable,
but there have not been sufficient changes to the Italian financial structure. Our
system still puts too much emphasis on financial debt and not enough on risk
capital, and banks continue to play too big a role in it, which then backfires,
making them more vulnerable during the negative phases of the economic
cycle. This makes life more difficult for those who want and are able to invent, to
paraphrase the historian Carlo Maria Cipolla, 'new things that please the world',
which is the only way to create solid economic development.
This slow progress is explained by the particular characteristics of
Italian firms, which influence demand, and those of financial entities, which
influence supply. Let's look at some of them. I must warn you that I shall be
focusing on insurance companies, regardless of their current importance in
corporate financing, for reasons connected not only with my role but also with
the future prospects for this issue.
Firms
Let's begin with the demand side, or rather with firms asking for loans. I
don't think anyone will be surprised if I remind them that Italian firms are
smaller than those in the other advanced countries. It is a well-known fact,
the causes and consequences of which have been widely debated. In a
recent book written by Anna Giunta and myself, which cites official Istat data
for 2012, the issue is summarized as follows:
... our economy ... has a great many firms with a very low average
number of staff: more than 4,426,000 firms in industry and services average
3.7 employees each (9.2 in the manufacturing sector) ... in Germany micro-
firms (up to nine employees) make up 84% of the total, in Italy 95%; 39% of
employees in German industry work for large firms (250 employees and
over), in Italy 22%.3
Company size and type of governance are inter-related and here we
can see another characteristic of our firms from an international point of view:
they are family firms not only as regards ownership and top management but
also as regards the second and third lines of command.4 Recent analyses
show that between 2008 and 2015 this tendency increased.5
Small family-owned firms where there is a strong presence of family
members in management are less productive, more poorly managed and less
inclined to innovate - and there is plenty of empirical evidence to support this.6
This is already sufficient to explain why this kind of firm tends to
approach a bank when it needs external financing rather than issuing bonds
to be traded on the market or selling its own shares privately to a fund or
publicly on the stock exchange. I would like to quote a couple of recent
research papers on the Italian market, written by Bank of Italy economists,
according to whom, in line with findings in the international literature, firms'
recourse to the bond market essentially depends on three factors: the need
to fund new investments; the company's reputation and transparency vis-à-
vis investors; and balanced financial and capital conditions.7
For our companies to want and be able to obtain funds from non-bank
financial institutions or directly on the market, they need to: increase the level
of management transparency; improve the quality of governance; produce
balanced and credible financial statements and industrial plans; and undergo
a profound cultural shift, including by acquiring new financial skills and
4
A. Giunta and S. Rossi, op. cit.
5
M. Bugamelli and F. Lotti, 'Productivity growth in Italy: a tale of a slow-motion change', forthcoming.
6
M. Bugamelli, L. Cannari, F. Lotti and S. G. Magri, Il gap innovativo del sistema produttivo italiano: radici e
possibili rimedi', Questioni di Economia e Finanza (Occasional Papers), 121, 2012. For an international
comparison see N. Bloom and J. Van Reenen, 'Why do management practices differ across firms and
countries?', Journal of Economic Perspectives, vol. 24(1), 203-224, 2010.
7
M. Accornero, P. Finaldi Russo, G. Guazzarotti and V. Nigro, 'First-time corporate bond issuers in Italy',
Banca d'Italia, Questioni di Economia e Finanza, 269, 2015; N. Branzoli and G. Guazzarotti, 'Il mercato
dei private placement per il finanziamento delle imprese', Banca d'Italia, Questioni di Economia e Finanza
(Occasional Papers), 262, 2015.
developing relations with investors whose needs are very different from those
of a traditional bank. All this is already within the reach of many medium-
sized and large firms. This needs to extend to other companies too.
Institutional investors
On the supply side, the first requirement of a thriving economy is to
have a large number of active institutional investors: insurance companies,
pension funds and other asset management entities involved in managing
savings, which facilitate the flow of resources to innovative firms with high
growth potential.
In Italy, the share of managed assets in households' total financial
assets remains below the average for euro-area and English-speaking
countries, despite strong growth in recent years (in 2016 the total volume
managed by institutional investors exceeded €1.4 trillion and reached 85 per
cent as a proportion of GDP). More importantly, only a small share of these
resources currently flow into the productive system. Institutional investors
hold just over one tenth of corporate bonds. In France, where the capital
market is more developed, the share is over 40 per cent.8 And that is in a
context where total bond issues are at much lower levels than in Italy.
Investors are certainly deterred by the limited development of pension funds
and of intermediaries specializing in the placement and underwriting of
corporate debt instruments, such as private debt funds, but there are also
more wide-ranging reasons.
Let's look at the insurance sector. Insurers' investments to cover
technical reserves focus on Italian government securities, with little appetite
for corporate bonds, much less equity. So far, insurance companies have
shown limited interest in the legislative and regulatory changes made to
encourage investment in productive firms.
Prudential regulation on own funds obviously influences this approach.
As we know, Solvency II introduced the principle that insurers' assets - on
which the solvency capital requirement is calculated - must be valued
according to riskiness, instrument by instrument. The metrics are very
granular and complex even when using the simplest of the three permitted
methods, i.e. the standard formula.
Non-rated bonds and unlisted shares are seen as very risky
instruments with high capital absorption; however, it is precisely these
instruments that small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) can issue, and
it is these, alternative to traditional bank loans, that we would like Italy's
numerous SMEs should make use of.
At IVASS we conducted a survey of insurance companies' investment
policies one year after the launch of the new regulatory framework. They
have not changed much. So the marked preference for government
securities, especially Italian ones, and corporate bonds with a high rating is
not new. Solvency II added the strong argument of capital absorption to
insurers' deep-rooted reluctance to invest in securities that are not perceived
as very safe.
The issue of financial support for SMEs, and the part that insurance
companies can play in this, is not just an Italian problem, but rather a
European one. The project for a capital markets union must take into account
any regulatory obstacles posed by Solvency II. The European Commission
has recently sent a Call for Advice (CfA) on the matter to the European
Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority (EIOPA), which shall reply by
the end of February 2018. Among the points which EIOPA will have to address
are insurance companies' investments in non-rated bonds, unlisted equity and
strategic interests, and how these are treated in order to calculate the solvency
capital requirement. The idea is to reduce capital absorption without sacrificing
anything in terms of the prudence needed in assessing a company's capital
adequacy - in short, to rationalize rules rather than soften them.
At IVASS we observe these possible developments at EU level with
great interest, aware that Italy's economic and financial structure badly needs
to evolve. We are supervisors, of course, and our mission is to guarantee that
insurance companies are sound in the best interest of the insured. We must
never forget that. But we are always ready to step in when reason and
common sense must be added to the rules that we are called upon to set at
European and national level.
The rest of the financial market
If further progress is to be made in overcoming the difficulty of matching
the demand and supply of funds then it is important that markets,
technologies and stakeholders develop the capacity to 'bundle' corporate risk
into financial instruments that meet the needs of final investors, such as
insurance companies, pension funds and households.
An example of this is venture capital funds, which use their ability to
evaluate young and highly innovative firms to reduce the very high
idiosyncratic risk of individual firms for their investors. Similarly, securitization
companies can offer investors bonds with different risk/return profiles bundled
into portfolios of assets not individually negotiable.
Banks play a crucial role in this evolution of the productive system's
model of financing, a role that affects not only firms but investors and
infrastructure as well. Banks can exploit their knowledge of the country's
entrepreneurial fabric and their key position in the distribution of savings
products, and they can provide valuable financial advisory services, helping
those firms that can gain access to the stock market or to forms of financing
other than loans; they remain at all times an indispensable reference point for
small firms. Offering a broader range of services can in turn help them to
diversify their sources of income.
The outlook
Opening up firms to external investors and developing a non-bank
financial industry are among the objectives of Europe's capital markets union
project. The European Commission recently published a report taking stock
9
of progress so far and relaunching the whole project. It is the most
promising international scheme in this area, despite the uncertainty and
lengthy negotiation times typical of European projects.
In the meantime, Italy needs to make a move.
In an attempt to increase the share of savings invested in the
productive system, the Government has recently set up individual savings
plans (Piani Individuali di Risparmio, PIR), asset management products that
are eligible for reduced taxation. Just a few months after their introduction,
the amount of funds collected, over €5 billion, is more than the Government
itself had projected. This is good news, although the risks should not be
underestimated, particularly as regards investor protection.
Another instrument that is fairly new to Italy and is proving increasingly
successful is the SPAC (Special Purpose Acquisition Company). Basically, it
is a small private equity firm that gathers funds from few investors on the
basis of the promoters' personal reputation. The money is then used to gain
control of a single target firm, which must be acquired within a stated period
of time of having set up the SPAC. A SPAC is listed and it in turn speeds up
the target firm's listing.
These are all interesting signs, and they need to take firm hold. Italy's
entire financial system must change to address the best and most innovative
firms, helping them to grow. The whole of Italy's economic future depends on it.
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