UniCredit, an Italian banking and financial services company, wants to sell a large portion of its non-performing loans along with its debt collection unit. The company reportedly has put up for sale a non-performing loan portfolio of an estimated 4 billion euros.
Italy's biggest lender by assets had given prospective buyers until last Thursday to send non-binding offers for its Credit Management Bank collections unit, which manages more than a third of Italy's non-performing loans.
Italy is slowly coming out of a two-year recession and banks are trying to shed some of their non-performing assets to make room for fresh lending to companies.
UniCredit officials have declined to comment on the sale or the value of the Credit Management Bank unit but have said there is strong investor interest for distressed assets in Italy.
UniCredit's CEO Federico Ghizzoni also has not publicly revealed details on the strategy of the bank regarding its asset manager Pioneer Investment, after it was reported last week that Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Ltd was considering a bid for the unit.
