Marina and Pier Silvio Berlusconi will jointly control holding company Fininvest, after the death last month of their father, ex-premier Silvio Berlusconi, a financial source told AFP following the reading of his will.
The two siblings, children of Berlusconi and the media magnate’s first wife Carla Dall’Oglio, will together hold a 53 percent stake in Fininvest.
Until now, they held 7.65 percent.
Berlusconi’s other three children, Luigi, Eleonora and Barbara, from his second marriage to Veronica Lario, will together control the remaining 47 percent of Fininvest, the source added.
They previously jointly owned 21.42 percent.
Berlusconi, who died June 12 at the age of 86 and whose fortune was valued by Forbes at 6.4 billion euros ($7 billion), controlled 61.21 percent of Fininvest.
“No shareholder will exercise overall individual indirect control of Fininvest SpA, previously exercised by their father himself,” said Fininvest in a brief statement Thursday, confirming that the contents of the will had been communicated to the heirs.
The family holding company controls a myriad of companies, including the MediaForEurope (ex-Mediaset) television group, headed by Pier Silvio Berlusconi, Mondadori publishing house, chaired by Marina Berlusconi, and the Mediolanum bank.
Marina Berlusconi, president of Fininvest since 2005, was confirmed in her position at a shareholders’ meeting at the end of June, as was CEO Danilo Pellegrino.
That meeting also approved the payment of 100 million euros in dividends to Fininvest shareholders this year, versus 150 million euros in 2022.
Net profit fell by 44 percent to 200.2 million euros last year — after 2021 earnings were inflated by capital gains from the sale of telecom infrastructure operator Towertel — while sales remained virtually stable at 3.82 billion euros.
Net assets amounted to 4.55 billion euros.
Following the announcement of Silvio Berlusconi’s death, MediaForEurope’s share price soared for several days on the Milan Stock Exchange, with investors betting on a sale of the group or a merger.
Fininvest then cut short the rumours, assuring investors that its activities “will continue in a line of absolute continuity in all respects”.
“In the family, we have never talked about selling Mediaset,” Pier Silvio Berlusconi said Tuesday.
