Italy's Treasury director said this week that the issue will be discussed in coming weeks, dampening hopes that the long-awaited sale was imminent.

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And in terms of the structure of the meetings, look, these are the leaders of Congress, and this is the President and the Vice President and the Secretary of the Treasury and Director of OMB, et cetera, et cetera.

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And the treasury's director-general, Mario Draghi, a former World Bank executive director, is regarded as a moderniser.

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