Investor Presentaiton
In the first place, much of the capital of Italian cooperatives is made up of "indivisible reserves",
which are not depreciated by fluctuations in the stock exchange and can partly be used in situations of
emergency to face temporary budget deficits.
In the second place, while in normal times members and dependent workers of Italian cooperatives
are paid according to national contracts negotiated by trade unions for each sector, in emergency
situations the Italian legislation allows cooperatives more flexibility in the use of workers time and in
their remuneration, with the aim of protecting jobs.
A third instrument has been that of creating start ups in neighboring sectors, so as to give new jobs to
surplus workers. Also, the coops umbrella organizations have used their solidarity funds to help
restructuring cooperatives in crisis as part of the mutuality within coops, particularly in the building
sector.
It must also be mentioned that the wide presence of cooperatives in many sectors of the economy has
allowed cooperatives to reap substantial “economies of networking”, enhanced by a tight umbrella
organizations support.View entire presentation