Antonio Fazio (born 11 October 1936 in Alvito,

province of Frosinone The province of Frosinone () is a province in the Lazio region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Frosinone. It has an area of and a total population of 493,605 (2016). The province contains 91 ''comuni'' (: ''comune''), listed in the ...

) is an Italian banker, who was the Governor of

Banca d'Italia The Bank of Italy (Italian language, Italian: ''Banca d'Italia'', , informally referred to as ''Bankitalia'') is the National central bank (Eurosystem), national central bank for Italy within the Eurosystem. It was the Italian central bank from ...

from 1993 until his resignation amidst controversy in 2005. After graduating in economics in 1960, he continued his studies at the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a Private university, private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Established in 1861, MIT has played a significant role in the development of many areas of moder ...

. He was assistant professor of Demographics at the Faculty of Economics of Rome University (La Sapienza) and Economic Consultant to the Economic Research Department of the

Bank of Italy The Bank of Italy (Italian language, Italian: ''Banca d'Italia'', , informally referred to as ''Bankitalia'') is the National central bank (Eurosystem), national central bank for Italy within the Eurosystem. It was the Italian central bank from ...

, which he joined as a staff economist in 1966. He is reported to be very religious, and close to the

Vatican Vatican may refer to: Geography * Vatican City, an independent city-state surrounded by Rome, Italy * Vatican Hill, in Rome, namesake of Vatican City * Ager Vaticanus, an alluvial plain in Rome * Vatican, an unincorporated community in the ...

. He has five children.

Career

He started work at the Bank of Italy in 1960. In 1993, after his predecessor

Carlo Azeglio Ciampi Carlo Azeglio Ciampi (; 9 December 1920 – 16 September 2016) was an Italian politician, statesman and banker who was the President of Italy from 1999 to 2006 and the Prime Minister of Italy from 1993 to 1994. A World War II veteran, C ...

left office to become the Italian Prime Minister, he became governor of the Bank of Italy. Some years after his appointment, it was said that he was interested in the leadership of the left-wing coalition to beat

Berlusconi Silvio Berlusconi ( ; ; 29 September 193612 June 2023) was an Italian Media proprietor, media tycoon and politician who served as the prime minister of Italy in three governments from 1994 to 1995, 2001 to 2006 and 2008 to 2011. He was a mem ...

's right wing one. After Berlusconi won the 2001 general election, however, he came to be considered closer to the centre-right.

The Antonveneta affair

In 2005, Fazio came under heavy pressure to resign (which he eventually did) over his role in allegedly rigging the competition to take over an Italian bank, Banca Antonveneta, earlier in the year. Published excerpts of tapped telephone calls strongly suggest that Fazio favoured an Italian bid, probably in order to sabotage a foreign bid from Dutch bank ABN AMRO.

Reaction of the government

Silvio Berlusconi's government, itself in troubled times because of the utter defeat in the regional elections of April 2005, was accused of weakness for not kicking Fazio out of office. On 21 September 2005, economy minister Domenico Siniscalco resigned in protest against the lack of determination in the government. The government maintained that it had no power to remove the governor of the central bank.

Investigations and resignation

Gianpiero Fiorani was arrested on 14 December 2005 for investigation of his role in the affair, and Fazio was officially put under investigation in

Milan Milan ( , , ; ) is a city in northern Italy, regional capital of Lombardy, the largest city in Italy by urban area and the List of cities in Italy, second-most-populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of nea ...

for

insider trading Insider trading is the trading of a public company's stock or other securities (such as bonds or stock options) based on material, nonpublic information about the company. In various countries, some kinds of trading based on insider informati ...

on 16 December. He is also under investigation in Rome for having pressured the apparatus of the Bank of Italy to give green light to Fiorani's takeover of Antonveneta. Although he had resisted calls to resign for months, these latest developments were the last straw, and Fazio stepped down on 19 December 2005. A new governor,

Mario Draghi Mario Draghi (; born 3 September 1947) is an Italian politician, economist, academic, banker, statesman, and civil servant, who served as the prime minister of Italy from 13 February 2021 to 22 October 2022. Prior to his appointment as prime mi ...

, was appointed on 29 December 2005. On 28 May 2011, An Italian court sentenced him four years in jail for market-rigging related to a 2005 takeover battle over Italian bank Banca Antonveneta. A Milan court has also ordered Fazio – who headed the Bank of Italy from 1993 to 2005 – to pay a 1.5 million euro ($2.14 million) fine for his role in the takeover saga pitting Dutch Bank ABN AMRO against Italy's Banca Popolare Italiana (BPI).

References

''Fazio under investigation for insider trading''
article from

La Repubblica (; English: "the Republic") is an Italian daily general-interest newspaper with an average circulation of 151,309 copies in May 2023. It was founded in 1976 in Rome by Gruppo Editoriale L'Espresso (now known as GEDI Gruppo Editoriale) and l ...

.
''Governor Fazio's daughter becomes a lay nun''
article from

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"Siniscalco: 'No more immobilism, I will go back to working as a professor'"
article from ''

''.
''Fazio shamed out of office at last''
article from ''The Economist'' Global Agenda, 19 December 2005. , - {{DEFAULTSORT:Fazio, Antonio 1936 births Living people Governors of the Bank of Italy Italian bankers People from the Province of Frosinone