Italy saw off the first of two foreign raids on its banking sector on Friday after Spain's BBVA dropped a 7 billion euro ($8.51 billion) take-over bid for Roman BNL in the face of domestic opposition. Dutch bank ABN Amro is also expected to give up its offer for Banca Antonveneta when its bid expires later on Friday since it did not manage to rally as much support as rival bidder Banca Popolare Italiana.
BBVA's exit clears the way for rival Unipol to gain control of Banca Nazionale del Lavoro, Italy's sixth largest bank by assets, after a protracted wrangle.
It also strengthens the view that Italy and some other European countries are impenetrable to foreigners, after French politicians on Thursday vowed to defend food group Danone should US drinks firm PepsiCo mount a bid.
"Italy remains not a fully-open market, but as you have also seen with Danone in France, the only open markets in Europe are Anglo-Saxon markets," Fox-Pitt, Kelton analyst Alessandro Roccati said.
BBVA and ABN Amro have suffered a number of setbacks in their attempts to become the first foreign players to buy an Italian bank, notably Bank of Italy Governor Antonio Fazio's opposition to predators from abroad.
Analysts said it was good news for BBVA as the bank was expecting to cash in a capital gain of 520 million euros by selling most of its near 15 percent stake in BNL. They expected BBVA to focus on its activities in Spain and Mexico.
"We should take this as a positive in the short term," said Santiago Lopez Diaz, analyst at Santander. "The uncertainty about BBVA having to raise the offer...is over. When BBVA started this process they had a capital loss (on the BNL shares). Right now BBVA has a capital gain."