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Italy names three women as heads of state firms

The Italian government named four new directors, including three women, to state-controlled companies Monday and capped executive pay at such firms at €238,000 a year.

Published: 15 April 2014 09:11 CEST
Italy names three women as heads of state firms
Emma Marcegaglia, ex-chief executive of employers' federation Confindustria, takes over at Eni. File photo: Tiziana Fabi/AFP

The shakeup affects some of the country's largest state-controlled companies: oil firm Eni, energy company Enel, industrial giant Finmeccanica and the Italian postal service.

Emma Marcegaglia, ex-chief executive of employers' federation Confindustria, takes over at Eni, while Patrizia Grieco, head of tech firm Olivetti, will be the new boss at Enel.

Gianni de Gennaro, already acting chief at Finmeccanica, was confirmed in his job. And Luisa Todini, a board member at public TV station RAI, takes the reins at the postal service.

All four bosses will have their gross annual salaries capped at €238,000, the same pay the country's president receives.

Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, who promised the pay cap when his government took office in February, has said he is looking to cut €500 million from executive salaries at state-run companies.

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BUSINESS

Rising oil prices help Italy’s Eni back to black

Italian oil and gas company Eni said on Friday the recovery in global crude prices along with record production helped it swing back into profit in 2017.

Published: 16 February 2018 11:19 CET
Rising oil prices help Italy's Eni back to black
Eni's headquarters near Milan. Photo: Marco Bertorello/AFP

The company turned a loss of €1.46 billion in 2016 into a net profit of €3.4 billion in 2017, much higher than the average of just under 2.0 billion expected by analysts surveyed by Factset Estimates.

Eni's shares climbed 1.5 percent in morning trade in Milan, which was up 1.2 percent overall.

In the fourth quarter alone the company recorded a net profit of €2.1 billion, six times the level of last year and more than three times the amount expected by analysts.

“We close 2017 with excellent results which underline how the process of intense change started in 2014 has transformed Eni into a company able to grow and create value even in difficult market conditions,” chief executive Claudio Descalzi said in a statement.

The rise in crude prices, from an average of $44 per barrel in 2016 to $54 last year, helped swell sales by 20 percent to €66.92 billion. Production also climbed by 3.2 percent to 1.82 million barrels of oil equivalent per day, a record annual average.

While Eni won't present its new three-year strategic plan until next month, it announced Friday it aims to increase output by another three percent this year by stepping up production at its existing fields in Egypt, Angola and Indonesia.

Eni has put exploration and rapid development of production at the heart of its strategy. Last year it launched production at Zohr in Egypt, the largest gas field in the Mediterranean, in a record time of two-and a-half years following its discovery.

It has diluted its holdings in some of those fields, including Zohr, as it strives to maintain financial discipline as it moves forward.

“Looking to the future, we see excellent growth prospects for all of our businesses,” said Descalzi.

“However, growth must be sustainable and we will pursue it in a disciplined way with great respect for the possibility of the most difficult operating conditions,” he added.

by Céline Cornu