Pirelli Negotiating Share Buyback

(Tire Review) Company chairman Marco Tronchetti Provera confirmed that Pirelli SpA is in talks to repurchase a 39 per cent stake in its tyre unit. Tronchetti Provera made the statement in Shanghai on November 30, where Pirelli launched its 2008 Pirelli Calendar. Pirelli sold the 39 per cent stake in Pirelli Tyre to a group of banks in July 2006 for 740 million euros. The original plan was to take that share public with an IPO. “We are very confident that there will be an agreement,” Tronchetti Provera told media in Shanghai, but he added that negotiations could take months.