Shares in Monte dei Paschi rebound at open

MILAN (Reuters) - Shares in Monte dei Paschi di Siena opened sharply higher on Wednesday, halting a string of losses that have shrunk the bank's market capitalisation to one ninth of the size of a planned 5 billion euro (4.31 billion pounds) share issue. Shares in Italy's third-largest lender, which must raise cash to clean up its balance sheet and stave off the risk of being wound down, tracked gains in Italian and European banking stocks. Monte dei Paschi shares fell for eight sessions in a row, shedding 26 percent of their value, after the unexpected resignation of CEO Fabrizio Viola on Sept. 8 added to uncertainty over the lender's future. New CEO Marco Morelli took over on Tuesday and is now expected to present a revised business plan for the bank in the first half of October. (Reporting by Valentina Za; editing by Agnieszka Flak)