Rome

THE Bank of Italy's (BOI) deputy governor said on Saturday that the vast majority of the country's banks are in a better state than the small lenders whose failure and subsequent rescue this year wiped out the savings of thousands of retail investors.

The government salvaged Banca Marche, Banca Etruria, CariChieti and CariFe at the end of November, using 3.6 billion euros (S$5.5 billion) from a crisis fund financed by healthy banks.