VARD PUBLISHES A CIRCULAR TO ITS SHAREHOLDERS IN RELATION TO THE GENERAL OFFER BY FINCANTIERI OIL & GAS

Trieste, December 15, 2016 – FINCANTIERI S.p.A. (“Fincantieri” or the “Company”) announces that, in relation to the voluntary conditional general offer ("Offer") launched on November 13, 2016 by its subsidiary Fincantieri Oil & Gas S.p.A. ("Fincantieri O&G") for the ordinary shares of Vard Holdings Limited ("Vard") not already held by Fincantieri O&G and its related corporations, today Vard has published a circular to its shareholders, through which Vard’s independent directors have recommended that Vard’s shareholders accept the Offer and the independent financial advisor has deemed the Offer as fair and reasonable.

The circular to shareholders is available on Vard’s website www.vard.com.

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The directors of Fincantieri O&G (including any who may have delegated detailed supervision of this press release) have taken all reasonable care to ensure that the facts stated and all opinions expressed in this press release are fair and accurate and that no material facts have been omitted from this press release, and they jointly and severally accept responsibility accordingly. Where any information has been extracted or reproduced from published or otherwise publicly available sources (including, without limitation, in relation to Vard), the sole responsibility of the directors of Fincantieri O&G has been to ensure through reasonable enquiries that such information has been accurately and correctly extracted from such sources or, as the case may be, reflected or reproduced in this press release.