Fondiaria cannot get consortium for standalone cash call

MILAN, April 24 (Reuters) - The conditions are not in place at the moment for Italy's Fondiaria-SAI to set up a banking consortium to guarantee a capital increase on a standalone basis, the insurer's Chairman Jonella Ligresti said on Tuesday.

The loss-making Fondiaria is involved in a complex deal to have peer Unipol save it through a four-way merger with three capital hikes including a cash call of 1.1 billion euros at Fondiaria itself.

"The market has changed. At this moment the conditions are not there for a consortium to guarantee such an operation on a standalone basis," Ligresti said at a Fondiaria shareholders meeting.

At a previous shareholder meeting in March to approve the 1.1 billion euro capital hike to help shore up the troubled insurer's capital base, Ligresti had said she felt confident the cash call could be carried out even without Unipol.

The Fondiaria group, controlled by Premafin, has said it is keen to press ahead with plans to merge with Unipol but wants to review the valuations involved in the operation.

(Reporting By Gianluca Semeraro, writing by Stephen Jewkes)