Italy nets 759m euros in air traffic sale

The Italian government on Tuesday sold part of air traffic service company ENAV on the stock exchange, netting 759 million euros ($836 million).

Investor demand for the 42.5 percent of the state-owned company was around eight times the amount of shares on offer, allowing the finance ministry to fix the sales price at 3.30 euros per share, towards the upper end of the initial range of 2.90 to 3.50 euros, the stock exchange said.

"The ENAV listing was a great success," said Italian stock exchange chief Raffaele Jeusalmi in a statement.

The flotation price values ENAV as a whole at 1.79 billion euros.

ENAV runs the control towers of 43 airports and four area control centres, handling 1.8 million flights per year and employing 4,200 people.