The supervisory board of French bank Banque Sanpaolo is discussing the bank's strategy for the period between now and 2007. The bank is to become the division of Groupe Caisse d'Epargne, the French savings bank group dedicated to services for small-and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). In order to emphasise this change in strategy, the bank is to change its name to Banque Palatine within the next few weeks.
The supervisory board is also to approve the creation of a factoring subsidiary, along with the bank's plans to transfer its asset management activities to Vega Finance as part of the plans of Groupe Caisse d'Epargne to set up a private bank.
