Pasquale Lucibello, President of the Bank of Cilento, Sassano and Vallo di Diano and Lucania.

Dr. Lucibello, on March 25th, the Shareholders' Meeting held in Vallo della Lucania unanimously elected you as the new President of the Banca del Cilento, Sassano e Vallo di Diano e della Lucania. What does this achievement mean to you?

My history at Banca del Cilento is long and rewarding: I am one of the founding members of the former BCC del Cilento and have been part of our credit institution for 27 years, serving for many years as vice president, deputy vice president, and chairman of the Executive Committee. In March, the members unanimously elected me President of the Bank, and for me it was a profound emotion as well as a source of great satisfaction. It's clear that the commitment continues to grow, but I won't shy away from new responsibilities. I will strive to lead our bank with the help of the Board of Directors and the general management team to make it ever stronger and increasingly a tool for serving our community. Our bank's name is very long, but we hope to soon be able to simplify it, making our credit institution even bigger.

BCC Cilento is the second largest BCC in Italy (after BCC Rome), covering Campania, Basilicata, and Calabria. Last year, you also acquired BCC Sassano: are there any further expansion and growth strategies planned?

After the merger of Banca del Cilento e Lucania Sud and BCC di Sassano in July 2016, we were the leading bank in Italy for territorial coverage for several months. We operate in three regions (Campania, Basilicata, and Calabria), four provinces, and 108 municipalities, with 23 branches and 150 employees: our area of ​​expertise coincides with the territory of Greater Lucania in Roman times. After a few months, our leadership in interregional coverage was taken from us by BCC di Roma, which in turn merged again, but we remain the second-largest bank in Italy in this regard. This is a great satisfaction for us, but we're not stopping there. Without giving too much away, I can confirm that a constructive dialogue is underway with one of our sister banks, and perhaps by the end of the year we'll be able to share further good news with our members: we'll expand even further, exceeding 30 branches. We're working hard to achieve this.

Given the current reform of cooperative credit, which consortium has your bank decided to merge with: ICCREA or Fondazione Trentino? What would this merger entail?

Like all mutual banks, we too had to make this choice, and as a Board of Directors, we proposed joining the ICCREA Group at the Shareholders' Meeting on March 25th. We explained the reasons to our shareholders: first of all, ICCREA is a company that has existed for years, is more structured, and has its own financial strength. It already possesses all the necessary characteristics to operate optimally, unlike the Fondazione Trentino, which is neither financially nor as a company, and must create these conditions from scratch. A bank certainly cannot sit idly by waiting for the parent company to establish the conditions for its operations. Furthermore, our vision differs from that of Cassa Centrale, and therefore, the "marriage" with ICCREA, with which we have already been working for years, was much simpler and more natural. The Shareholders' Meeting unanimously approved the Board of Directors' proposal, which was the result of a thoughtful and responsible decision: we preferred certainty to uncertainty.

You relied on ESB for your network's anti-money laundering training and refresher courses. How and why did you choose our business school?

Banca del Cilento, by its very nature, has always been committed to ensuring adequate training for its employees. To this end, we have always provided training staff, with the goal of making our staff increasingly prepared and capable of meeting the demands of an ever-evolving market: those who don't stay up-to-date have no opportunity for growth. Therefore, training is a strategic choice made by our Bank. Regarding anti-money laundering training in particular, after initial contact with the European School of Banking Management, we met and sat down to get to know each other better. We learned what training means and how they deliver the relevant training programs, and we were impressed by their expertise, professionalism, and national relevance. They have always been available and ready to support us, and we were extremely proud to be able to entrust them with the training of our employees. Some of our internal control managers have completed the most advanced anti-money laundering training with the School and achieved the highest level of certification: we are therefore more than satisfied with our choice.

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