Merrill is believed to have joined forces with Fortress Investment Group, a private equity firm, to buy the portfolio, which is likely to be valued at about E2 billion.
Intesa is keen to offload the loan burden, which would represent one of the largest sales of bad loans in Europe, in order to come in line with the Basel II protocol rules and new international accounting standards.
As a result of the new rules encouraging European banks to clean house, heavyweight international finance companies have been attracted by the prospect of cheap deals. Merrill Lynch is currently playing catch up as Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley have already done deals in Germany.
However, the purchase could yet fall through. The respective parties are believed to have been in negotiations for almost a year already without finalizing an agreement.
