Italy is also renowned for it's bureaucracy, sometimes much worse than the US's red tape is. God only knows how many permits, this, that, fill in this form, dot that line etc they have to jump through as well.
We have the money, is it certified? what do you mean certified? Oh, you need to go do THIS form, then go to see THOSE people, get THIS approval BEFORE you can go see THAT group and give them this other form, to get permission to fill out these other forms.... you get the idea.
I remember when I was applying for the mortgage on my house, well we need to see this.... produce papers..well can you verify that.... ok verified... well we need additional information about this... on and on and on. I can kind of see something like buying an already operational company, with debts, and most likely structured paybacks etc etc, being at least as difficult to try to navigate.
Aaron