In Italy, media coverage of the triumph of Brexit has been wall-to-wall as Italians worry about the collateral damage and wonder if they too dare…
So far La bomba Britannica has hit the Milan stock market much harder than the London one. On Friday, Milan fell by 12 per cent against the FTSE-100’s 3.5 per cent.
Italy’s banks — too numerous, too small, undercapitalised and saddled with alarming levels of toxic debt — took the biggest hit. New eurozone rules that ban government bailouts for big depositors have turned them into sitting ducks. Shares in Monte Paschi di Siena (bailed out once already in 2013 by Italy’s central bank) fell by more than 13 per cent. In the past six months, Italy’s banks have lost 56 per cent of their share value.
But there was good news for Italian clam fishermen and restaurants specialising in spaghetti con le vongole: at long last the European Commission has agreed to increase the permitted minimum size of vongole by 3mm to 25mm.
But the economic situation in Italy at the dark heart of the eurozone remains bleak and the urge to get the heck out grows.
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