The value of voting rights in Italian cooperative banks: a quasi-natural experiment

What is it about?

The Italian government has passed a reform that forces the largest co-operative banks to transform into joint-stock companies. This implies, in particular, a shift from a "one head-one vote" system to a "one share-one vote" system, inducing a realignment between ownership and voting powers. The market reaction to the reform has been significantly positive, and can be used to extrapolate an estimate of the efficiency gains expected from the reform. Based on our findings, we estimate a market appraisal of around 14% of these expected benefits, suggesting that the realignment between the share of ownership and voting rights is likely to produce significant benefits to the reformed banks.

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