INTERVIEW-Impregilo chairman confident about Panama bid

By Danilo Masoni

MILAN, June 14 (Reuters) - Impregilo SpA (IPGI.MI), Italy's No. 1 construction group, is confident about its bid for a contract to expand the Panama Canal, its chairman told Reuters on Sunday, clarifying comments he made at a meeting this week.

On Friday, Massimo Ponzellini said a consortium including Impregilo obtained top marks in the technical appraisal of bids to expand the canal linking the Caribbean to the Pacific. [nLC54515]

But the Panama Canal Authority replied it had not yet picked the winner of the largest contract in the $5.25 billion expansion. [nN12397212].

"I think my remarks have been misunderstood," Ponzellini said in an telephone interview.

Ponzellini also said he was not aware of any offers by Libya's sovereign wealth fund to join Impregilo's biggest shareholder IGLI. The vehicle company, whose shareholders are the Benetton, Ligresti and Gavio families, owns 29.9 percent of Impregilo.

During a historic visit last week by Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi to Italy, Libyan officials said they were interested in investing in Italian infrastructure companies, such as Impregilo.

((Editing by Daniel Flynn; danilo.masoni@thomsonreuters.com; +39 02 661 29 734; Reuters Messaging: danilo.masoni.thomsonreuters@reuters.net))

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