The “Lion of Trieste” no longer roars with one voice.

The Italian insurer Generali, which is often called that because of its heraldic animal and its place of birth in Italy, has decided on a new three-year plan - but not unanimously.

According to some Italian media, the financial company's board of directors is divided for the first time in its history.

In view of the group's history of 190 years, this is a bold thesis that the company does not want to confirm, but it is certainly noteworthy that two important votes on the board of directors openly announced their opposition on Wednesday evening: It is the luxury goods entrepreneur Leonardo Del Vecchio , the major shareholder of the glasses manufacturer Essilor-Luxottica, as well as the building contractor and publisher Francesco Gaetano Caltagirone.

Christian Schubert

Economic correspondent for Italy and Greece.

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For several months they have been fighting the French Generali CEO Philippe Donnet.

They want to overthrow him at the annual general meeting on April 29th next year.

They indicate differences of opinion about the strategy, but internal experts also suspect considerable personal animosity.

The Generali leadership around Donnet cannot ignore the attacks, as Del Vecchio and Caltagirone are the company's second and third largest shareholders.

More money planned for shareholders

The new strategic plan, which Generali presented in Milan on Wednesday, provides for whopping profit increases and billions in distributions to shareholders. Net earnings per share are expected to grow by 6 to 8 percent annually until 2024, the company plans to distribute up to 5.6 billion euros in cash dividends to shareholders, while at the same time reducing debts, investing in digitization and possibly also undertaking significant takeovers. “These ambitious goals and initiatives are possible because we have fulfilled our previous strategic plan,” said Donnet, who has been at the helm of Generali since 2016. The shareholders could now reap the fruits of the old plan for the years 2018 to 2021: Generali will start a share buyback of 500 million euros - the first in 15 years.The insurer wants to give the shareholders up to 6.1 billion euros; that is around a third more than in the past three years.

CEO Donnet wants to make it difficult for shareholders to turn away from him.

The Frenchman is aiming for a third term in April and knows the largest Generali shareholder, the Italian bank Mediobanca, behind him.

But Mediobanca only holds 13 percent of the capital and 17 percent of the voting rights due to a securities loan, while the rebels Del Vecchio and Caltagirone already have a good 15 percent of the capital shares with an allied foundation.

How the other shareholders vote in April is still unclear.

What is the background to the power struggle?

On Wednesday, the CEO's powers of persuasion definitely reached their limits: one of the 13 members of the board of directors deliberately stayed away from the meeting - it was the representative of Del Vecchio - while the other opponent, the entrepreneur Caltagirone present, was against the plan was true. The background to the power struggle is partly in the dark. The critics Del Vecchio and Caltagirone accuse Generali of a rather vague “lack of ambition”, not least when it comes to takeovers. Asia is an uncultivated field. The gap to the two biggest competitors, Allianz from Germany and Axa from France, can never be closed.

But beyond strategic differences, some observers also recall an old dispute between Del Vecchio and Mediobanca boss Alberto Nagel: Three years ago, he refused Del Vecchio's donation of 500 million euros to a Milan cancer research center. Mediobanca is the center's largest financier. Del Vecchio - who is considered the richest man in Italy but was never interested in financial companies - allegedly got a 20 percent share in Mediobanca out of bitterness and is now waging a kind of proxy war at Generali.

The Generali top responded to the criticism that it had fulfilled the goals of the strategic plan once advocated by Del Vecchio and Caltagirone. Acquisitions are a possibility, but only if you fit together strategically and culturally, stressed Donnet on Wednesday. Size alone cannot be the goal. Generali did not make any major acquisitions under his leadership. The latest property was the Italian insurer Cattolica, whose majority takeover cost Generali 1.2 billion euros. The group is thus expanding its market leadership in Italy.

Generali emphasizes that the gap to the competitors Allianz and Axa has shrunk under Donnet and the shareholders in the Italian company are doing better.

Since the Frenchman took office, Generali's shareholders have enjoyed a total return on their shares of 111 percent, according to the data company Refinitiv, compared to just 66 percent in the case of Allianz and just 45 percent in the case of Axa.

Generali therefore wants to continue the course it has taken so far, but to become faster and make a few shifts in emphasis.

The business in accident and property insurance as well as in asset management is to be expanded.

The share was slightly positive on Wednesday.