The Italian stock market does not reflect the size and strength of the country’s economy. Today, it counts around 400 companies, with a total market capitalization equivalent to 47% of GDP. In France, that ratio exceeds 100%; in the United Kingdom, it reaches 130%, and in Sweden, it stands at 185%. The gap we see in Italy limits the resources available for investment as well as companies’ opportunities for growth.
A study by SDA Bocconi School of Management, conducted in collaboration with Borsa Italiana, seeks to measure just how much this gap costs the country. The research goes on to investigate what would happen if the Italian equity market reached 1,000 listed companies and a market capitalization equal to 100% of GDP. In this target scenario, estimates indicate that there would be a 0.95 percentage-point uptick in GDP growth, a 2.09-point increase in tax revenue, and a 1.93-point reduction in the unemployment rate.
The benefits would stem from building a broader, more liquid, and more accessible capital market, capable of connecting savings with businesses and fueling investment, innovation, consolidation, and employment. The estimates cited above therefore quantify the opportunity cost Italy bears due to its underdeveloped equity market.
A shallow market
Italy has a business landscape replete with profitable companies as well as substantial private savings, but only a small share of these resources reaches businesses through equity capital. Bank financing and debt continue to play a dominant role in the business world, while hundreds of companies potentially suited to listing remain in private hands.
The result is a shallow market in which sectors that are crucial to the country’s competitiveness—such as industry, technology, consumer goods, and healthcare—are underrepresented. The limited presence of listed companies, in turn, diminishes investor interest, analyst coverage, and trading liquidity. Deep equity markets, by contrast, are associated with better capital allocation and stronger economic growth. We also know that going public can facilitate access to resources for investing, acquiring competitors, innovating, and achieving international scale.
The study addresses three related questions:
- What macroeconomic effects could a more developed Italian equity market produce?
- What differences can be observed, at the organizational level, between listed and unlisted companies?
- Which businesses could make up a realistic pipeline of new IPOs capable of growing the Italian market to 1,000 listed companies?
A target achievable within ten years
The researchers combined a scenario-based macroeconomic analysis with a comparison of the performance of listed and unlisted companies. Using data from the Orbis database available through 2024, they examined company performance over the 2015-2024 period, considering revenue and employment growth, productivity, investment, financial structure, and profitability. For mergers and acquisitions, the time horizon was extended to 2015-2025.
The analysis starts from the state of the Italian market in 2025, when stock market capitalization was equivalent to 47% of GDP, and constructs three counterfactual scenarios in which the ratio reaches 80%, 100%, or 125%. Then for each one, calculations are done to determine how GDP growth, tax revenue growth, and the unemployment rate would have changed.
The results are as follows: Raising the market capitalization-to-GDP ratio to 80% would be associated with an additional 0.60 percentage points of GDP growth, 1.30 points of higher tax revenue growth, and a 1.20-point reduction in the unemployment rate. With market capitalization equal to 100% of GDP, the estimated effects would rise to 0.95, 2.09, and 1.93 points, respectively. In the most ambitious scenario, at 125% of GDP, these figures would reach 1.40, 3.07, and 2.85 points.
By comparing companies, we can find the explanation for the mechanisms that could support these results. Between 2015 and 2024, the revenues of listed companies grew by an average of 8.2% per year, compared with 4.7% for other companies. Listed companies also generated 24% more revenue per employee and allocated an average of 6.8% of revenue to investment; this figure was 4.2% among unlisted companies. In addition, employment and profitability data show a clear advantage for listed companies.
The propensity to engage in extraordinary transactions is particularly striking. From 2015 to 2025, listed companies, despite accounting for just 0.01% of Italian businesses, initiated around 20% of the merger and acquisition deals carried out in Italy, corresponding to 30% of their total value. The stock market therefore appears to facilitate growth through consolidation, which Italian companies often lack, preventing them from attaining internationally competitive scale. However, these differences cannot be attributed entirely to being listed. Other contributing factors include companies’ larger size, the selection of businesses that are already more dynamic, management quality, and more structured governance arrangements. In any case, taken together, the findings from this research describe an ecosystem in which access to capital, investment, productivity, and growth tend to reinforce one another.
To determine whether the target of 1,000 listed companies is a realistic one, the researchers then analyzed the universe of unlisted Italian companies, cross-referencing company size and sector. A potential pipeline was identified of 602 net new listings over approximately ten years, which would generate €489 billion in initial market capitalization.
Of the 602 possible new listings, 313 would involve large companies with revenues exceeding €250 million. These enterprises would account for 52% of new listings but generate 88% of the new market capitalization. At the same time, the number of listed companies with revenues between €100 million and €250 million would need to ramp up by around four and a half times, helping to fill the so-called missing middle of the Italian stock market.
The bridge between savings and growth
Going public should be regarded as an industrial strategy tool that enables companies to finance investment and acquisitions, attract talent, improve governance, and support generational transitions. Mechanisms such as multiple-vote shares, a gradual expansion in free float, and the continued active involvement of founding families can enable family businesses to grow without losing their identity and entrepreneurial continuity.
However, the goal of 1,000 listed companies requires a coordinated policy that acts simultaneously on the supply of and demand for capital. On the one hand, a larger share of household savings needs to be channeled toward the real economy through simple, transparent, and tax-efficient instruments; one way to do so is by revitalizing the experience of Individual Savings Plans (PIRs). On the other hand, pension funds, pension institutions, insurance companies, and foundations should take on a more decisive role as long-term investors in listed Italian companies.
On the corporate side, the study proposes structural, rather than occasional, tax incentives that offset at least some of the costs of accessing and remaining on the stock market. The IPO tax credit could become permanent, accompanied by measures designed to reward capital increases. Moreover, a revision of the tax system should curtail the advantage currently afforded to debt over equity.
There is also a need for intermediaries, analysts, advisors, and market makers capable of supporting companies and making them visible to investors. Particular attention should be paid to financial research on small- and mid-cap companies, to lower information asymmetries and improve liquidity and price discovery.
The stock market must become the bridge connecting one of Italy’s greatest sources of wealth—its savings—with companies that are seeking to grow, so they are not forced to look elsewhere for the capital, scale, and the future they need.
The study, already presented on 22 September 2026, at the Chamber of Deputies of the Italian Parliament, will be the focus of an event at Borsa Italiana on October 30.
Stefano Caselli, Maria Chiara Merola, Marta Zava, More stock market, more growth: Italy’s 1,000 listed companies , in collaboration with Borsa Italiana.
