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MILAN (Reuters) - A potential merger between Deutsche Bank and rival Commerzbank does not signal a new wave of banking consolidation in Europe, the chairman of Italy’s biggest retail lender Intesa Sanpaolo said on Monday.

“It is a specific situation. I do not see the symptoms for a wave of consolidation,” Gian Maria Gros-Pietro told reporters on the sidelines of an event in Milan.

“Small operations can certainly be done, they can be useful and increase efficiency but it doesn’t seem to me the conditions are there to create those big synergies that are indispensable for mergers that bring advantages to all the banks involved.”