By late spring, Italy's banking world was swept up in a storm of convoluted takeover bids and counterbids involving a swathe of the country's major lenders. Three months later, only one high-profile bid is still standing.

It started with UniCredit 's July decision to drop the "drag" of its nearly 15-billion-euro ($17.5-billion) bid for Banco BPM on the cusp of the proposal's natural expiry, citing the opacity of conditions imposed by the Rome administration via its "golden power" screening rules. Then, Mediobanca 's shareholders this month voted against the lender's roughly 7-billion-euro offer for Banca Generali , thwarting what was widely seen as a defensive play against state-backed Monte dei Paschi 's (MPS) interest in at least 35%

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