Tuttifrutti

Non sempre è facile essere italiani, in particolare quando si è il Presidente della BCE. Lo ha sperimentato, una volta di più, Mario Draghi che, nel corso della conferenza stampa tenutasi lo scorso 25 ottobre, ha risposto a 27 domande dei giornalisti, delle quali 15 direttamente rivolte alla situazione dell’Italia e delle sue banche. Vi riportiamo il testo delle 15 domande poste a Draghi, senza commenti e senza sottolineature, con il semplice obiettivo di esaminarne l’accuratezza, l’intelligenza e la profondità che le ha animate. Ce ne sono davvero per tutti i gusti …..

Second question is about Italy, as you can imagine. In the past you said, “Look at the facts and not the words”, but the facts have been coming in and then haven't been that good. There's a budget in breach of EU rules; it's been rejected by the Commission. Now with facts on the table, what is your assessment now?
Still again about Italy. I would like to refer to your recent statement that the Italian situation was not posing any risks of contagion. My question is whether you confirm this statement or whether it has changed.
Another question on the situation in Italy. There have been some concerns that weaker Italian banks could become capital impaired if the spread with German bonds reaches 400 basis points. Do you think that this could compromise the monetary transmission mechanism? If so, what tools do you see available for repairing that?
You mentioned that you thought there would be a deal between Italy and the EU. Do you sympathise at all with what Italy's argument is; that it needs more budget flexibility, given also that its budget deficit is still planned to be below 3% – even if that isn't how the Commission sees it? Do you sympathise with their argument?
Would it be possible to get some sense of what exactly the options are for the Governing Council should the news flow remain as poor as it has over the past. Should the news flow, should the data continue to be bad, should the market turmoil continue, should relations between Rome and Brussels worsen and you are forced to downgrade your assessment for the outlook. It seems as though there's a very high bar to continuing to expand QE past the end of this year. Are you starting to talk about what you could do with reinvestments or what you could say on the path of interest rates?
Two questions, if I may. If I'm right, next year there will be a new calculation of the capital key, with probably an increasing weight of Germany and a decreasing weight of Italy. What consequences does it have for the reinvestment programme next year?
The second question concerning Italy: do you see a danger that the ECB will come under a kind of fiscal dominance from Italy? Or is Italy still in the heads of the ECB Council and its meetings?
The second question: you again mentioned progress in strengthening of the euro area. There was little progress on this front. How frustrated are you by that fact? How worried are you that the discussion we have about Italy might even limit the willingness to move forward?
The other question is actually there again on Italian banks, just because the Italian government is really outspoken about its worries about the spread and Italian banks. Could you say, what are the tools, what can the ECB – but most of all a government – do in a world which is a BRRD world now?
One quick question on the Commission proceeding. Would it be counterproductive, possibly, to enforce the rules against Italy? It might make the deficit worse if you fine them and, with the view to the European Parliament elections coming up, just motivates the anti-European sector of the electorate even more. Can the rules be enforced? Would it be counterproductive to enforce them?
As a follow-up to my colleague's question just now about OMT, Italian politicians seem to have an expectation that if the spread rises too much, the ECB will somehow intervene. That's why I wanted to ask the following: in case the ECB in any future crisis surrounding Italy would – or any other country –feel the need to intervene by purchasing sovereign debt of individual member states, would the OMT programme really be the only available tool? Or would there still be a way conceivable to do it outside the OMT programme?
You have mentioned the spread between the Greek and the Italian bonds that – which is now less than 70 basis points. I don't know if you consider this to be a fair valuation considering what we have seen. There's a rating difference between the two bonds.
Italy has already been downgraded by Moody's to one notch above investment grade. What would happen if, some time in the future, all four ratings agencies lowered Italy to below investment grade and that would mean then that Italian banks could not use their government bonds as collateral at the ECB? Have you considered that scenario, and what tools would you have to help the banks?
Second question, if I could, is: you've said you were very confident about a compromise…
Would you ever consider playing some kind of mediating role, given your knowledge of Italy?

Trovate il testo integrale della conferenza stampa, direttamente sul sito della BCE, cliccando qui.