Banca Ifis

Banca Ifis S.p.A.

Company type	Società per azioni
Traded as	BIT: IF
Industry	Financial services
Founded	1983
Headquarters	Venice, Italy
Key people	Frederik Geertman (CEO) Ernesto Fürstenberg Fassio (Chairman) Sebastien Egon Fürstenberg (Honorary Chairman)
Products	Retail, Factoring, Specialty finance (commercial credit, acquisition/management and disposal of portfolios of non-performing loans and tax receivables, leasing and rental)
Number of employees	1,940 [1] (31 December 2023)
Website	www.bancaifis.it

The Banca Ifis S.p.A. Group (Istituto di Finanziamento e Sconto) is an Italian finance company that specialises in lending services to undertakings, and acquiring/servicing non-performing loan portfolios.^[2]

Founded in 1983 by Sebastien Egon Fürstenberg, son of Clara Agnelli, Banca Ifis has been listed on the Milan Stock Exchange (FTSE Italia STAR segment) since 2003.

I.Fi.S., financial intermediary for factoring for small enterprises in Italy, was founded in 1983 in Genoa, where Sebastien Egon Fürstenberg, founder of the company and the current President, resided at the time.

I.Fi.S was established in Genoa as a financial intermediary mainly for the acquisition of trade receivables and the provision of financing in the form of factoring. I.Fi.S. is the captive company of the Americanino group: it helps finance the suppliers of the denim company and liquidate customer receivables.^[3]

In 2002 Banca Ifis was authorised to carry out banking activities, and it changed its name from Ifis to Banca Ifis SpA. The same year, it became a Bank and joined Factor Chain International to operate on a global level, after opening its branches in Romania and Poland.  In 2003 Banca Ifis was admitted to the MTA (Mercato Telematico Azionario, the Online Stock Market), and in 2004 it entered the STAR [it] segment.

The Bank's strategy is based on increasing its market share through the development of its historic core business: financial and management support for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in Italy and abroad. In 2008 Banca Ifis entered the world of retail with the launch of Rendimax, the high-yield online savings account.^[4] In 2013, it expanded its offer with the Contomax online current account.^[5]

About the same time, Banca Ifis also branched out into what would become its second core business: the purchase and management of impaired loans by acquiring Toscana Finanza in 2011.^[6]

In 2016 Banca Ifis acquired Ge Capital Interbanca for 119 million Euro (with one billion of assets), entering the fields of leasing, medium-term lending and structured finance. Banca d'Italia acknowledged the operation on 29 November of the same year.^[7]

In 2018, development continued in the area of Non Performing Loans (NPL): Ifis Npl S.p.A., a joint-stock company established following the spin-off of the Npl Area of Banca Ifis, became fully operational, 100% controlled by the parent company. In 2018 the Bank entered the pharmacy lending sector, acquiring 70% of Credifarma S.p.A., a company jointly held by Italian Federfarma.^[8] The same year, it acquired Cap.Ital.Fin. S.p.A., a financial intermediary specialised in personal salary-backed loans.^[9]

In January 2019 Banca Ifis purchased FBS S.p.A., a company that operates in the NPL sector as a specialist in servicing activities, for €58.5 million,^[10] which today is included in Ifis Npl. 

The Central Business Department was set up in 2019, bringing together all the business areas aimed at supporting enterprises. In October 2019 Banca Ifis completed the purchase of 10% of the remaining share capital of the subsidiary FBS S.p.A. and became its sole shareholder, consolidating its position as a major player in the market of non-performing loans in Italy.^[11][12]

In April 2020 the Banca Ifis Group formed a new vision of NPLs: the names of FBS S.p.A. and FBS Real Estate S.p.A.were changed to Ifis Npl Servicing S.p.A. and Ifis Real Estate S.p.A. The companies of the new Banca Ifis NPL Division were created with the aim of making the organisation more efficient and allowing it to effectively seize the best opportunities on the market.^[13]

Banca Ifis announced that it had successfully completed the competitive process for the purchase of 70.77% of the share capital of Farbanca S.p.A.^[14][15]

On 1 January 2021 corporate reorganisation was completed in the Npl area, creating a vertical chain to guarantee the separation and independence between credit purchase and collection activities.^[16]

Since April 2021 Frederik Geertman becomes the new Chief Executive Officer of the Group.^[17]

In April 2022, the merger by incorporation of Credifarma into Farbanca, which was approved in February, ends with the creation of Banca Credifarma, the first specialised pole in financial services to pharmacies.^[18][19][20]

In May 2023, Banca Ifis acquired the company Revalea Spa from the Mediobanca Group, born the previous year from the demerger of MBCredit Solutions Spa and active in the recovery of impaired loans.^[21]

In September, to mark the 40th anniversary of the Bank's foundation, the Bank inaugurated the "Parco Internazionale di Scultura", a permanent exhibition of monumental sculptures created at the behest of Ernesto Fürstenberg Fassio in the gardens of the 16th-century Villa Fürstenberg, the Group's historical headquarters in Mestre.^[22][23]

In April, the "Parco Internazionale di Scultura" was officially opened to the public. The exhibition hosts plastic works of contemporary sculpture by Italian and international artists, including Fernando Botero, Igor Mitoraj, Manolo Valdés, Pietro Consagra and Roberto Barni.^[24][25]

• Banca Ifis is among the leading national operators in factoring in terms of turnover, with a market share of 4,2%, after Gruppo Intesa Sanpaolo (27%), Unicredit (19%), Ifitalia (11%) and Factorit (6%).^[26]
• Banca Ifis holds a 4,1% market share in leasing, positioning itself after Unicredit Leasing (14%), Intesa Sanpaolo Group (13%), BNP Paribas Leasing Solution (8%), Alba Leasing (7%), Iccrea BancaImpresa Group (6%), UBI Leasing (6%), Société Generale Equipment Finance Leasing (6%), MPS Leasing & Factoring (5%), Sardaleasing (4%), Credemleasing (4%), Crédit Agricole Leasing Italia (3%) and SelmaBipiemme Leasing (2%).^[27] Furthermore, Banca Ifis is a leader in electric car leasing.^[28]
• In the NPL segment, Banca Ifis is the sixth largest national operator in terms of assets under management with €24.4 billion worth of these preceded by doValue (68 billion Euro), Cerved Credit Management (46), Intrum Italia (41), Prelios Credit Servicing (40) and AMCO (35).^[29]

The shareholding structure communicated to Consob is as follows. The shareholding percentages are notified by the shareholders, in accordance with the provisions of article 120 of the Consolidated text of the provisions on financial intermediation (TUF). Minor parts of the shareholder structure can be indicated directly by the company through other sources. The share capital of Banca Ifis is equal to 53,811,095 Euro, divided into 53,811,095 ordinary shares with a par value of 1 euro. The following table shows Banca Ifis's shareholders that, either directly or indirectly, own equity instruments with voting rights representing over 3% of Banca Ifis's share capital (data updated on 17 April 2024):^[30][31]