The Italian government buying a stake in Fiat-parent Stellantis is currently not on the cards but the possibility might strike again if the automaker requested it, industry minister Adolfo Urso told Reuters. He raised the prospect of Rome buying shares in Stellantis earlier this month amid a spat over the company’s commitment to Italy. However, since then both parties have made conciliatory remarks to ease tensions. “Today (…) it is obvious that this is off the agenda,” the minister said in an interview with RAI public radio.
Urso said that though the deal is not currently on agenda, “it is clear that if the company were to say ‘we absolutely need an Italian public shareholding’ then a debate, a confrontation, would take place.” However, in June last year, Stellantis Chairman John Elkann had said that the company did not need the Italian state as a shareholder.
Stellantis was created in 2021 after the merger of France’s Peugeot-maker PSA, and Italian-American Fiat Chrysler. The company accounts for virtually all of Italy’s car production. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni often accused the group of putting France’s interests over Italy’s, describing the group’s birth as an “alleged” merger that “actually disguised a French takeover”. Currently, 6% of Stellantis is owned by the French government.
However, Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares reiterated a commitment agreed with Rome in order to boost the carmaker’s output in Italy to one million vehicles by the end of the decade, from around 750,000 last year. Thanks to this comments, there was a clarity that plant closures are not happening in Italy, particularly in the Mirafiori complex in Turin, and Pomigliano, near Naples.
In a separate development, Stellantis issued a cautionary outlook, signalling a challenging year ahead after experiencing a 10% drop in operating profit during the second half of 2023. The decline was primarily attributed to protracted strikes at its North American operations, a crucial profit centre for the company.