Italy holds local vote as chance of snap national election fades

Bloomberg

Italians voted in the first round of municipal elections on Sunday in a test of the country’s political mood after a multi-party deal on a new electoral law unraveled this week, making the prospect of a snap national vote this year unlikely.
“It was our duty to try, but the game’s over,” former Prime Minister Matteo Renzi told daily Corriere della Sera in an interview published on Saturday. “Now we have a horizon of almost a year before the election, let’s work for Italy.” The current legislature expires in 2018.
Investors rejoiced on June 8 as the possibility of Italian elections in the autumn—potentially leading to either a hung parliament or a win of the anti-establishment Five Star Movement—was reduced. A pact between Renzi, head of the Democratic Party, and Beppe Grillo’s Five Star Movement unexpectedly collapsed in parliament.