Banks from Italy, Ireland, Spain and Austria have come out worst in the latest European Union stress test.<br /><br /> The verdict: that there is still work to do to boost credit to the bloc’s economy. <br /><br /> Italy’s Monte dei Paschi – or MPS – is one of the poor performers in the European Banking Authority’s test of 51 EU lenders.<br /><br /> “The seriousness of the situation of MPS was already clear. It is the most penalised bank, while one of the best banks is Intesa,” said Guido Gennaccari, a financial analyst with Trading Room Roma. <br /><br /> “This was already clear in graphics at the beginning of the year. Stocks suffered with the bail-in, then with the Brexit, and now with the stress test.”<br /><br /> Here are the 11 worst-performing banks in the European bank stress test: https://t.co/disj7NJAyp pic.twitter.com/Kd54MK5tCe— Bloomberg VisualData (@BBGVisualData) 29 July 2016<br /><br /> MPS confirmed less than an hour before the results that it had finalised a plan to sell off its portfolio of non-performing loans – and had assembled a consortium of banks to back a five billion euro capital increase.<br /><br /> The stress test looked at how banks could withstand a three-year, theoretical, economic shock. <br /><br /> It is the third of its kind in the EU since taxpayers had to bail out lenders during the financial crisis between 2007 and 2009. <br /><br /> Monte dei Paschi, RBS and Allied Irish sent to the back of the class in EU stress tests https://t.co/0TpiLGke3T pic.twitter.com/er1XANBEki— Financial Times (@FT) 29 July 2016<br />
