Links and Shearman advise on €4bn UniCredit rights issue

Linklaters is advising UniCredit, with head of capital markets in Italy Luigi Sensi and partner Claudia Parzani leading on the deal.

Shearman’s head of corporate in Italy Domenico Fanuele and Rome-based corporate partner Michael Bosco are heading the team advising Bank of America Merrill Lynch and UniCredit Bank as global coordinators and bookrunners.

Shearman is also advising Credit Suisse, Goldman Sachs, Mediobanca and UBS Investment Bank as bookrunners, and BNP Paribas, Nomura and Société Générale Corporate and Investment Banking as co-lead managers.

The rights issue includes Italian, German, Polish and US aspects and, according to Bosco, indicates a change of attitude in Italian business to entrust both international and domestic aspects of a capital markets deal to international firms.

“One of the most significant aspects of the deal is that we’re now seeing something developing, which started emerging a couple of years ago, which is the dual side model of representation, in that one firm does both the Italian and international side of the deal,” said Bosco.

“Only in the last couple of years been we been able to get big deals on the Italian side.”