UniCredit rights issue priced at huge discount

MILAN (Reuters) - UNICREDIT (UCG.IT) launched a 7.5 billion euro ($9.8 billion) rights issue at a massive discount on Wednesday, highlighting the struggle faced by European lenders under pressure to raise capital to counter a spreading debt crisis.

Italy's largest bank by assets was forced to launch the biggest rights issue by a European bank for more than a year to repair its ravaged balance sheet and meet stringent capital rules meant to enable the region's lenders to withstand the crisis and restore investor confidence.

The closely watched share offer was priced at a 69 percent discount to Tuesday's closing price -- a much higher discount than that used by UniCredit's peers in recent rights issues and a level which may discourage other lenders from tapping the market to raise money.

The European Banking Authority has told banks they must to find 115 billion euros of extra capital by the end of June to reach a minimum core capital level of 9 percent -- with lenders in Italy, Spain and Germany needing the most.

At 8.0 billion euros, UniCredit's shortfall is the biggest of any bank after Spain's Santander , which needs 15 billion euros to meet the EBA requirements -- a crucial plank of efforts by euro zone leaders to avoid financial disaster.

Andrew Lim, banks analyst at Espirito Santo, said the discount on UniCredit's capital increase was "massive."

"Whatever way you slice and dice it, UniCredit's discount is much bigger than for the other banks and that being the case, I think it's come as a bit of a shock to some investors, and I think some of them are just bailing out," he said.

UniCredit shares, which have lost more than half their value over the past year as the crisis spread to Italy, fell 10 percent after it detailed the issue, and were down 8.5 percent at midday.

In another sign of the challenges faced by the bank, UniCredit said commitments by shareholders so far would result in a maximum subscription of around 24 percent of the new share offer -- a lower take-up than had been anticipated.

The consortium of banks underwriting the issue, led by Mediobanca and BofA-Merrill Lynch, was extended to spread the risk of part of the offer not being taken up by the market, and is now made up of 27 lenders.

NEW INVESTORS?

The rights issue, which will start on January 9 and conclude on January 27, represents more than 50 percent of the bank's current market capitalization of 12.5 billion euros.

Centrobanca analyst Elena Perini calculated that an issue price of around 2 euros would lead to a dilution of adjusted earnings per share of nearly 65 percent in 2012-13.

Another analyst said that at 24 percent, the take-up by UniCredit's historic shareholders -- including cash-strapped foundations which hold around 13 percent of the bank -- was lower than expected.

"From the comments we had had, we were expecting 30, 35 percent...That's a big adjustment," said the London-based analyst, asking not to be named.

In the run-up to the capital hike, Blackrock fund cut its stake in UniCredit to 1.7 percent from 4 percent. The Libyan sovereign wealth fund, whose 2.6 percent stake was frozen in the wake of the civil war, has not yet said whether it would sign up to the offer.

That could open the door to new investors, with Italian media citing Chinese and Singaporean sovereign funds as possible candidates. UniCredit CEO Federico Ghizzoni has said he would welcome new shareholders if they were interested in the bank's long-term development.

UniCredit announced the rights issue in November, together with 6,150 job cuts and a retreat from key business operations to repair its balance sheet after revealing a 10.6 billion euro third-quarter loss due to massive writedowns.

It priced the two-for-one rights issue -- its third capital increase since 2008 -- at 1.943 euros per share.

The price represents a discount of 43 percent to the theoretical ex-rights price (TERP) -- the market price a stock theoretically has after a new rights issue.

Intesa Sanpaolo priced its rights issue last year at a 24 percent discount to the TERP. Smaller Italian lender Banca Popolare di Milano priced its recent rights issue at a 40 percent discount, while a rights issue by German group Commerzbank last May came at a 30 percent discount to the TERP.

UniCredit shares were down 8.4 percent at 5.80 euros at 1147 GMT, having earlier been suspended from trading for excessive losses.

($1 = 0.7661 euro)

(Additional reporting by Michel Rose, Antonella Ciancio, Gianluca Semeraro in Milan and Simon Jessop in London; Editing by Dan Lalor and Jodie Ginsberg)