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Italy Set to Strip Atlantia of Highway License, Di Maio Says

Italy Set to Strip Atlantia of Highway License, Di Maio Says

(Bloomberg) -- Italy’s government is now in position to strip the Benetton family’s Autostrade per l’Italia SpA of its license to operate more than half of the country’s highways, a key majority leader said.

A law that took effect on Wednesday “finally starts the process that allows us to revoke the concessions for some infrastructure,” Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio, who is also leader of the Five Star Movement, said in a Facebook post.

Italy Set to Strip Atlantia of Highway License, Di Maio Says

The decree aims to reduce the compensation -- potentially billions of euros -- that the state may have to pay out should it revoke the concessions after the deadly Genoa bridge collapse of 2018. It also prevents the company, a unit of the billionaire Benetton family’s Atlantia SpA, from unilaterally withdrawing from the contract.

A decision on the revocation is coming in early 2020, Premier Giuseppe Conte said at a year-end press conference. Parliament must confirm the new rules within the next two months.

Atlantia shares fell as much as 2.9% in Milan trading on Thursday, the worst performers on the FTSE MIB benchmark index. Fidentiis said in a note today that the toll-road operator’s equity story continues to be affected by “significant elements of uncertainty that have a relevant impact on the risk profile of the stock.”

Italy Set to Strip Atlantia of Highway License, Di Maio Says

Notes issued by Atlantia and its unit Autostrade per l’Italia also fell. Autostrade’s EU500m 2025 note fell 2.1 euro cents to 108.1, its biggest daily drop since late November.

Italy has a lot of “concrete evidence of lack of maintenance,” Transport Minister Paola De Micheli said in an interview with Radio 24, according to news agency Agi. She was responding to questions about potentially revoking the Autostrade concessions.

Di Maio said he is not worried about potential job losses if Autostrade is stripped of its license.

“The Benettons will lose profits and this is right because they haven’t done what they should for the bridge’s maintenance,” he said. “We have to take back those operations and the workers will clearly stay in employment.”

--With assistance from Chiara Remondini and Marco Bertacche.

To contact the reporter on this story: Alessandro Speciale in Rome at aspeciale@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Chad Thomas at cthomas16@bloomberg.net, Christopher Maloney, Michael B. Marois

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