Italy to pay up to £17B to break up troubled banks

ROME: Italy will pay up to 17 billion euros ($19 billion) to break up two insolvent Venetian banks, which have posed a threat to country’s banking system, the government announced Sunday.

Both face bankruptcy and European authorities had urged Italy to devise a rescue framework, selling off the good assets of the stricken Banca Popolare di Vicenza and Veneto Banca and transferring their toxic assets to a “bad bank,” essentially financed by Rome.