MILAN: UniCredit Chief Executive Andrea Orcel on Thursday said his bank was not buying shares in Popolare di Sondrio, dismissing as “noise” a newspaper report about UniCredit being the lender behind stakebuilding in the smaller rival.

Daily Il Sole 24 Ore on Thursday reported that a US investment bank had been building a 10% stake in Popolare di Sondrio to allow an Italian lender to become a significant shareholder, with UniCredit being the leading candidate.

“No, I’m not,” Orcel told Bloomberg Television in an interview when asked if UniCredit was buying shares in Popolare di Sondrio.

A veteran investment banker whose strategy constantly draws speculation given UniCredit’s large stash of excess capital, Orcel reiterated his stance about mergers and acquisitions potentially being a tool to accelerate growth at the right conditions.

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“Every time I sit in an interview there is something. Yesterday it was Commerzbank, today Popolare di Sondrio… We’re very disciplined in saying: is it strategic? And does it fit in terms of valuation,” Orcel said.

“We know what is strategic, but valuations are misaligned. So there is a lot of intermediaries, and a lot of noise of people who try to create transactions but the numbers don’t fit.”