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ROME, Nov 20 (Reuters) - An Italian court cleared the way on Wednesday for Europe's biggest toll-road operator Autostrade to raise tolls, over-ruling a government move to restrict increases.
Autostrade cannot hike tolls beyond government-forecast inflation without specific authorisation.
The company has argued that as inflation came in above government targets between 1998 and 2002, it should have the right to hike tolls in 2003 above the government CPI forecast to recoup lost earnings from the earlier period.
The government, battling to push inflation back below the ECB's two-percent ceiling, said in September it wouldn't authorise such an increase.
That decision by the state-run road agency ANAS prompted analysts to downgrade Autostrade and its share price fell 10 percent, although it has since recovered.
After Wednesday's court decision, ANAS said it did not intend further to oppose Autostrade plans for toll hikes.
In the first nine months of the year, tolls accounted for 1.53 billion euros of Autostrade's revenues out of a total of 1.7 billion euros. Any cap on tariff hikes would have adversely impacted the company's top line revenue.
"ANAS's move had certainly damaged (Autostrade's) valuation, and now this decision should boost it," one Milan-based analyst said.
A financial source said, however, that a favourable decision from the court had already been factored into the price of a recent takeover offer for Autostrade by the Schemaventotto holding company, which owns 30 percent of the road operator.
Earlier this month Schemaventotto, which is controlled by the Benetton family, offered eight billion euros ($8 billion) or 9.5 euros per share for a full takeover of Autostrade.
Autostrade shares closed up 0.9 percent at 9.55 euros.
Latest official data put Italian inflation at 2.7 percent year-on-year in October.