Banca Pop. Vicenza to shed up to 1,500 (2)

(ANSA) - Milan, October 26 - The Banca Popolare di Vicenza said Wednesday it would have to shed 1,300-1,500 jobs as part of a restructuring essential to its survival after a recent bail-out.
    "We must convince the trade union organisations that we have these redundancies, for which we have to find a solution," said the bank's president, Gianni Mion.
    He said these were "structural" redundancies, it isn't a temporary thing".
    "We're not in a position to wait".
    Last month the ecently bailed-out bank posted a 795-million-euro loss in the first half of the year. The balance sheet was weighed down, a statement said, by an increase in credit cover, the effects of the "contested exit" of Cattolica from the insurance market, and the litigation risk linked to new shares. Without these factors, the loss would have been 85 million euros, the bank said.