Italy’s deputy prime minister pushes to water down bank windfall tax

Italy’s deputy prime minister Antonio Tajani: ‘The main thing we are asking for, is for the banks that aren’t under the ECB’s [supervision] to be excluded from the tax’

Italy’s deputy prime minister has called for the government’s bank windfall tax to be watered down just a week after the controversial levy was unveiled, in a sign of mounting tensions within the rightwing coalition.

Antonio Tajani, who also serves as foreign minister and leads the Forza Italia party, said in an interview published on Tuesday that the windfall tax should not apply to the country’s smaller lenders.