Monte dei Paschi chairman says talks of CEO replacement are groundless

MILAN (Reuters) - The chief executive of Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena Fabrizio Viola has the full backing of the lender's chairman and reports he will be replaced are groundless, the bank's chairman said on Friday. A report by Il Giornale daily cited financial sources as saying Viola would be removed. "The reports regarding a replacement of the CEO are completely unfounded," Massimo Tononi said in a statement. Viola and former chairman Alessandro Profumo are under investigation for alleged false accounting and market manipulation. Viola and Profumo were drafted in back in 2012 to turn the bank round after its balance sheet was wrecked by overpaying on the purchase of a rival bank and engineering risky derivatives trades. (Reporting by Stephen Jewkes; editing by Agnieszka Flak)