Bankinter | Técnicas Reunidas enjoys a record order book and a healthy balance sheet, including a positive net cash balance. However, margins continue to be tight and this is the main source of uncertainty in the medium term. Furthermore, the reduced visibility of the oil and gas price recovery and the low diversification of its business (focused on the Middle East), leads us to increase our caution.
Nitesh Shah (Wisdom Tree) | With the coronavirus spreading around the world, the market is understandably scared that demand for crude oil will fall hard this year. Brent oil prices have fallen from a peak of US$68/barrel in the first week of January to US$56/barrel currently (24/02/2020). We believe that the backwardation in the Brent oil futures curve is generated by the fact that OPEC is ready to intervene.
Enagás has signed an agreement with another Spanish firm, Ampere Energy, to jointly develop several R&D projects for hydrogen production with solar energy and batteries. This will be carried out at the regasification plant in Cartagena (Murcia), owned by Enagás.
Last week, Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez implemented a package of 30 measures to tackle the challenge of depopulation and demography in Spain. Sánchez is firmly commited to cohesion, equality between territories and the creation of opportunities “where they do not exist.” He has already appointed an executive commission to lead the project.
Ranko Berich (Monex Europe) | Jay Powell and the Fed have taken the warning financial markets have given about coronavirus over the past weeks to heart and brought out the big guns with a 50bp intra-meeting rate cut. This is a tool that has not been used since 2008, and comes after a serious worsening in the global macroeconomic outlook due to the Covid-19 outbreak shattering previous optimistic assumptions that it would be mostly contained within Q1.
With an investment of 4 billion euros, Acciona plans to build renewable energy facilities in the next five years which will generate a combined total capacity of about 5 gigawatts (GW). These new allocations will be added to the portfolio of 10,117 megawatts (MW) which the Spanish group has installed and in operation, with 56% in Spain and the remaining 44% abroad. This has already made it one of the main global players in the sector.
Bank Of America Global Research | We lower our Euro area growth forecast to 0.6% for 2020 (-40bp), on the back of lower foreign demand (global growth downgraded to 2.8%, from 3.1%), supply chain disruptions and at least temporarily lower domestic demand from local virus hot-spots. We keep our 2021 forecast unchanged at 1.1%, assuming a permanent loss in activity. Euro area growth is expected be close to zero in 1H20 (with negative quarters in Italy and Germany part of our base case).
Capital Madrid | For the first time in its history, Bankia reached the level of 20,000 million euros in assets managed in investment funds. This was done at the end of January, during which Bankia again led the market in terms of net income, according to data from Inverco.
Renta 4 | Ferrovial (FER) obtained a net profit of 268 million euros last year, which managed to settle in “black numbers” and thus reverse the losses with which it had closed 2018 and had been justifying over the first three quarters of 2019, thanks to the capital gains from the sale of the Ausol highway in Malaga.