MILAN, March 22 (Reuters) - Italy's Fiat received a third offer for its insurance unit Toro, which the industrial group had put up for sale to raise cash for a turnaround of its loss-making car arm, Italian newspapers said on Saturday.
They said French insurer Groupama emerged as a third bidder for Toro, joining Italian publisher De Agostini and a joint offer from Italian insurer Unipol and an investment firm, Hopa, controlled by financier Emilio Gnutti.
Friday was a deadline to present binding offers, the papers said.
Fiat declined to comment on the reports.
"We have chosen not to comment on the matter until the talks are concluded," a Fiat spokesman said.
Toro is Italy's sixth-largest insurance group and is valued by analysts at 2.0-2.5 billion euros ($2.12 -$2.65 billion).
De Agostini and Unipol-Hopa have already announced that they were bidding but did not disclose how much they would pay for Toro.
Newspapers said their offers put a price tag of 2.0-2.2 billion euros on the insurer. Fiat's cash-burning car arm Fiat Auto dragged the industrial group into a record 4.26 billion euro net loss in 2002. Fiat is trying to sell some of its best performing units, including Toro and aviation arm Fiat Avio, to inject cash into Fiat Auto.
Il Sole 24 Ore financial daily reported that Fiat would hold an extraordinary board meeting on Saturday to evaluate the offers, while other papers said the board would meet on March 27 as scheduled before.