Monte dei Paschi, an Italian bank, Falls on Hard Time

choi

Jack Ewing and Gaia Pianigiani, Medieval, Seeking Renaissance; Siena, Italy, courts investors after a bank's downfall. New York Times, June 16, 2015.
www.nytimes.com/2015/06/16/busin ... d-its-identity.html

Quote:

(a) "near collapse of Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena, the world’s oldest bank

(b) "Italy [] has barely grown since the 1990s

(c) "Since its founding in 1472, Monte dei Paschi and its wealth have been at the center of life in Siena. The bank survived plagues, panics and wars. Its headquarters are still located inside a medieval fortress.

"But modern financial hubris felled the centuries-old bank. In 2008, Monte dei Paschi acquired a rival to become Italy’s third-largest bank. The €9 billion price tag was considered too high, even at the time, and bank management compounded the blunder by engaging in a series of derivatives transactions that later produced huge losses. * * * the bank is gasping under a pile of bad loans and has effectively put itself up for sale, which could mean moving its headquarters away from Siena.


My comment:
(a) There is no need to read the rest.
(b) Siena
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siena
(capital of the province of Siena, in the region of Tuscany; inhabited by an Etruscan tribe called the Saina)
(c) Monte dei Paschi
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banca_Monte_dei_Paschi_di_Siena
("Founded in 1472 by the magistrate of the city state of Siena, Italy, as a 'mount of piety [Italian: monte di pietà; qv],' it has been operating ever since. * * * Its current form dates from 1624, when Siena was incorporated in the Grand Duchy of Tuscany and the Grand Duke Ferdinando II granted to depositors of Monte, in their warranty, the income of the state-owned pastures of Maremma [place name] (the so-called 'Paschi' which gave the bank its name)")

* Indeed, Monte di Pietà was this bank's founding name.

choi

(d) Italian English dictionary
* dei (prep[osition] di + article i): "of the, from the (+ a masculine noun in plural not starting with a vowel [which uses article l' when singular], gn, pn, ps, s+consonant, x, y, nor z [all of which use article lo when singular])"
en.wiktionary.org/wiki/dei
  ^ Italian grammar
        en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_grammar
        (section 1 Article; section 8 Preposition)
* pasco (noun masculine; noun plural: paschi; Italian verb: pascere to graze): "1: pasture  2: feeding  3:food"
en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pasco
* pietà (noun feminine; Latin [noun feminine] pietās [pity, piety]): "1: pity, compassion  2: piety"
en.wiktionary.org/wiki/piet%C3%A0
* beato (adjective masculine): “blessed”
en.wiktionary.org/wiki/beato

(e) "As Siena looks to reinvent itself, the city, in part, is looking to that past. With a large and well-preserved medieval center, Siena is crowded with tourists in the summer but is often underbooked the rest of the year. * * * But [no matter what] tourism will not replace the high-paying jobs Monte dei Paschi once provided. To fill that [financial] gap, local and regional officials are trying to turn Siena and the surrounding province of Tuscany into 'Pharma Valley,' an international center for drug research and development."
(i) Tuscany is a region, so "province of Tuscany" is a misnomer. See Tuscany
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuscany
(section 7 Administrative divisions)
(ii) "Tuscany is named after its pre-Roman inhabitants, the Etruscans."  Wikipedia for "History of Tuscany"
(iii) "The origins [as well as name meaning] of the Etruscans are mostly lost in prehistory."   Wikipedia for "Etruscan civilization," which went on to say "The ancient Romans called [them] the Tusci or Etrusci" -- thus explaining the English proper nouns.

(f) A photo caption: “The Monte dei Paschi Foundation’s headquarters are located inside of the Palazzo Sansedoni, a medieval fortress.”
(i) Palazzo Sansedoni, Siena
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palazzo_Sansedoni,_Siena
(ii) “The palazzo takes its name from the Sansedoni family, one of Siena’s leading aristocratic dynasties during the Middle Ages. Probably the most eminent member of this family was Beato Ambrogio Sansedoni ([born, bishop and died in] Siena, April 16th 1220 – March 20th 1286"

* Beato is not part of his name. See (d). The English cognates are “beatified” or “beatific” (read its etymology).