The Consumer Price Index (CPI) has shot up by 7.4%, the biggest rise since July 1989, according to the National Statistics Institute (INE) on Monday, which will have to be confirmed in two weeks’ time. Inflation is driven, as has been the case for months, by the price of energy, but it is already spreading to the rest of the goods and services in the consumer basket. In fact, core…
Last week there was already talk about the possibility of excluding some Russian banks from the SWIFT system, so the decision announced by Ursula Von der Leyen in the early hours of Sunday morning was not entirely unexpected. It is considered a “weapon of (economic) mass destruction”. The decision to exclude banks from the SWIFT system has never before been applied to a banking system as interconnected as the Russian…
Spain is not in a situation of lack of gas supply in the coming months, as it has scheduled the arrival of a total of 56 ships of liquefied natural gas (LNG) between February and March. It also continues to implement all possible preventive measures to contribute to the guarantee of energy supply, with the launch last week of four other extraordinary ‘slots’ – rights to unload LNG – as…
Carlos Segovia explains in El Mundo that “Since Thursday a powerful threat of impoverishment has been looming in the EU, particularly in the countries that were already lagging furthest behind in the recovery, with double the unemployment and higher inflation. That is Spain, unfortunately, which had already been slowing down in recent weeks. It was symbolic that Pedro Sánchez cancelled his participation in the Spain Capital Markets forum organised by…
Fernando González Urbaneja | Russian journalist Masha Gessen wrote a biography of Putin ten years ago (“The Man Without a Face” Debate) which was recommended reading then and even more so now. In chapter 3 (Autobiography of a Thug) she sketches the character that Putin’s unofficial biographers did not hesitate to highlight when praising his character. During his youth in Leningrad (now and formerly St. Petersburg) he behaved like a…
Banco Santander held an extraordinary board meeting yesterday afternoon to approve the rebalancing of powers between its executive chairwoman, Ana Botín, and the CEO, José Antonio Álvarez, financial sources told Europa Press. With this decision, Álvarez will report directly to the board of directors and not to Botín, as he has been doing until now. This is a situation requested by the European Central Bank (ECB), so that the entity…
Germany’s coalition parties agreed on Wednesday a roughly 13 billion euro package of measures to help households cope with surging energy prices, including scrapping a surcharge levied on electricity bills to support green power, as reported by Reuters. Energy prices in Germany have soared in the last year, and fears of an escalation of the crisis between Ukraine and gas supplier Russia are set to push them higher still. Germany’s…
Tatiana Orlova (Oxford Economics) | In the early hoursoftoday, Russian military forces attacked military targets across Ukraine. Border guards reported that Ukraine’s territory was being shelled from five regions, including Crimea and Belarus. Due to events over the past 24 hours, with Russia now intent on installing a “friendly” government in Ukraine, we have moved our global baseline in line with our scenario for a full-scale invasion. Although a protracted…
Link Securities | Telefónica today presented its results for the 2021 financial year, as outlined below: The company’s January-December 2021 results have achieved the upwardly revised annual financial targets in Q2’2021. o Revenue and OIBDA; “stable or slight growth (year-on-year organic)”. Revenues +2.0% and OIBDA +1.4% in 2021. o Return to normalized level of CapEx to sales ratio ex-spectrum of up to 15%. CapEx to sales to reach 14.2% in…
The Council of Ministers has authorised the state to hike its stake in Indra (IDR) through SEPI. It will increase its control from the current 18.7% to 28%. “The motive behind the government’s reasoning is greater control in a key company for the country’s defence system”, says Renta 4. At current prices, the increase in its stake would mean an investment of just over 150 million euros. According to press…