ROME/MILAN, July 21 (Reuters) - The Bank of Italy has received at least three binding offers for four small Italian banks that were rescued from bankruptcy in November after a deadline to submit bids expired on Thursday afternoon, a source close to the matter said.
A second source said that U.S. fund Apollo Global Management and private equity firm Lone Start were among the bidders. Neither source gave a name for the third bidder.
On Wednesday, Apollo was the sole bidder for the lenders, several sources said.
The November rescue of Banca Marche, Banca Etruria, CariChieti and CariFe drew 3.6 billion euros from a deposit guarantee fund financed by Italian lenders.
Italy’s banking association head Antonio Patuelli has said that healthy banks will have to contribute further if the four rescued lenders are sold for less than 1.65 billion euros. (Reporting by Stefano Bernabei and Massimo Gaia; editing by Emilio Parodi and Steve Scherer)
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